Dell VxRail vs. VMware ESXi

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Dell VxRail
Score 8.8 out of 10
N/A
The Dell VxRail is a VMWare-based hyper-converged infrastructure appliance.N/A
VMware ESXi
Score 9.0 out of 10
N/A
A bare-metal hypervisor that installs directly onto a physical server. With direct access to and control of underlying resources, VMware ESXi partitions hardware to consolidate applications and cut costs.N/A
Pricing
Dell VxRailVMware ESXi
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
Dell VxRailVMware ESXi
Free Trial
NoNo
Free/Freemium Version
NoYes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
Dell VxRailVMware ESXi
Considered Both Products
Dell VxRail
Chose Dell VxRail
All of these solutions scored very close together in our testing. Nutanix actually was the highest scoring in ease-of-use, but the integration with Vmware and the pricepoint led us to choose VxRail.
Chose Dell VxRail
At the time we had a deployment of SimpliVity which did not measure up. We demo'd other products such as HyperFlex. We appreciated the ease of use of the VxRail and the overall value.
VMware ESXi

No answer on this topic

Top Pros
Top Cons
Features
Dell VxRailVMware ESXi
Server Virtualization
Comparison of Server Virtualization features of Product A and Product B
Dell VxRail
-
Ratings
VMware ESXi
8.7
127 Ratings
4% above category average
Virtual machine automated provisioning00 Ratings8.5115 Ratings
Management console00 Ratings8.8127 Ratings
Live virtual machine backup00 Ratings8.4111 Ratings
Live virtual machine migration00 Ratings9.3115 Ratings
Hypervisor-level security00 Ratings8.3116 Ratings
Best Alternatives
Dell VxRailVMware ESXi
Small Businesses
StarWind HCA
StarWind HCA
Score 9.6 out of 10
Proxmox VE
Proxmox VE
Score 9.3 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies
StarWind HCA
StarWind HCA
Score 9.6 out of 10
VMware vSOM (discontinued)
VMware vSOM (discontinued)
Score 10.0 out of 10
Enterprises
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure
Score 9.0 out of 10
VMware vSOM (discontinued)
VMware vSOM (discontinued)
Score 10.0 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
Dell VxRailVMware ESXi
Likelihood to Recommend
10.0
(3 ratings)
9.0
(128 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(6 ratings)
Usability
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(5 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(2 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(2 ratings)
Support Rating
-
(0 ratings)
9.8
(55 ratings)
Implementation Rating
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(3 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
9.9
(2 ratings)
Contract Terms and Pricing Model
-
(0 ratings)
5.7
(2 ratings)
Ease of integration
-
(0 ratings)
9.9
(2 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(2 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(2 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
10.0
(2 ratings)
User Testimonials
Dell VxRailVMware ESXi
Likelihood to Recommend
Dell Technologies
As Dell EMC VxRail comes as pre-built, the deployment process is simple and easy. It is possible to scale out easily and will get support from the vendor instantly. As it is a Hyperconverged Infrastructure and it is also the integration of Dell EMC hardware and Vmware, the flexibility that VxRail provides is effective. An organization that is looking for all in one place like data management, network management, Integration, and backup software ecosystem can go for this product.
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VMware by Broadcom
If you're looking for the industry standard in server virtualization, I would recommend ESXi. After decades of expertise in the field, VMware continues to provide a strong product, production-ready, with an easy-to-learn interface that allows for quick management along with less costly upfront onboarding and training. Grab the free personal-use license and install in your homelab to start!
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Pros
Dell Technologies
  • VxRail gives us a standard, predictable, unit of scale and purchase.
  • Infrastructure maintenance and upgrades are much easier than on a traditional infrastructure stack.
  • Performance tuning is much easier and more straightforward than on a traditional infrastructure stack
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VMware by Broadcom
  • Resource management. The automatic load balancing works very well to ensure no host is taxed disproportionately compared to the others.
  • Templates and cloning. It is very easy to set up a template and spin up new servers based on a specific setup. This makes server management very streamlined.
  • VM management. The vSphere interface is very easy to use and navigate. Everything is responsive and it works when you need it to. The options are also robust while also being arranged in a straightforward manner.
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Cons
Dell Technologies
  • The software release cycle is slow compared to general release of software. Particularly with VMware based releases.
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VMware by Broadcom
  • VMware ESXi can improve on the UI that is installed on the bare metal machine. The menus can be hard to navigate when looking for simple configuration items.
  • VMware ESXi can improve on the stability of their overall hypervisor. There have been a few times we had to reinstall due to corruption of VMware ESXi.
  • I would like to see VMware ESXi do better at adding more standard free features in their consumer version of VMware ESXi. For example, having the ability to back up virtual machines is good practice and something that would be very nice if offered in their free version.
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Likelihood to Renew
Dell Technologies
No answers on this topic
VMware by Broadcom
It is critical to our business, what started out as a way to do certain functions, it has now become core to ensuring our product is available to our customers and reducing our costs to operate and reduce our recovery time and provisioning servers. Their support is great and the costs to renew is reasonable.
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Usability
Dell Technologies
No answers on this topic
VMware by Broadcom
The interface is fairly intuitive for most things, and the areas that are a little less obvious usually have fantastic documentation in the online knowledgebase. In 3-4 years of managing our ESXi hosts, I think that I have only opened 4-5 support cases for things that I could not figure out myself or find answers to on the website.
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Reliability and Availability
Dell Technologies
No answers on this topic
VMware by Broadcom
Without the need to patch the servers with bug fixes and enhancements we whave not experienced any downtime with VMware issues. Even the bug fixes and updates do not cause of downtime as we just migrate the servers to the opposite node and update the one and then move servers back. Very simple and painless.
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Performance
Dell Technologies
No answers on this topic
VMware by Broadcom
We do not notice any difference between a physical and virtual server running the same workload. In fact we can scale quicker with the virtual server than we can with the physical.
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Support Rating
Dell Technologies
No answers on this topic
VMware by Broadcom
I can't say enough good about VMware's support team. To an individual they take ownership of the case, provide thorough answers, and follow up regularly. On one occasion, a problem we experienced with NSX Endpoint was escalated to development for a permanent resolution after a workaround was found. In my experience, most companies would have tried to find a way to close a case like that instead of taking it all the way. Most importantly, when production is down and every second counts, they VMware teams understand that urgency and treat your issue as if it were the only one they had to deal with. You can't ask for better.
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Implementation Rating
Dell Technologies
No answers on this topic
VMware by Broadcom
Jsut read and follow anything your storage provider may require to allow the integration of VMware with storage operations, outside of that VMware jsut works.
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Alternatives Considered
Dell Technologies
All of these solutions scored very close together in our testing. Nutanix actually was the highest scoring in ease-of-use, but the integration with Vmware and the pricepoint led us to choose VxRail.
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VMware by Broadcom
As long as you're using Nutanix AOS on Nutanix hardware and are paying their software support fees, AOS is a valid competitor to VMware and can save money due to not needing a license and having their server management system built into the base host management system. If you aren't using Nutanix hardware, however, VMWare is in most cases the best way to go. I cannot comment on HyperV, but most IT people I know either use it because they have to (most) or they like it better (not many).
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Contract Terms and Pricing Model
Dell Technologies
No answers on this topic
VMware by Broadcom
it has been fair and easy to understand. I know VMware is looking at wanting to change from CPU to core pricing so we will see what that looks like when it happens.
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Scalability
Dell Technologies
No answers on this topic
VMware by Broadcom
We started out with a two-server cluster and adding a third or fourth is very straightforward and simple with no issues. You just need to be aware of the size of your Vcenter Server to handle the workload, but still the resources needed is very minimal
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Return on Investment
Dell Technologies
  • We were able to exponentially reduce the cost spending to buy different components.
  • As it has VMWare integration, possible to work on different operating systems.
  • Automation of IT operations helped the colleagues to work on different manual tasks.
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VMware by Broadcom
  • VMWare ESXi licensing is affordable for our business - and the licensing model is simplistic. Not like that of Microsoft with having to keep track of server licenses and CAL licenses for users.
  • VMWare ESXi also has hardware-monitoring built-in, so that further saves us money from having to be spent with another vendor.
  • As much as I hate the saying "a single pane of glass" does fit for this product. You can manage your servers, monitor hardware status, create and export backup snapshots, manage virtual NICs, connect to various storage devices. We're very happy with this product.
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ScreenShots