IBM Storage FlashSystem vs. NetApp AFF A-Series

Flash storage is an ideal solution for environments demanding high input/output operations (I/O) and frequent read/write cycles. We successfully deploy this technology for a client's high-performance backup infrastructure, where it serves as the backend storage for multi-stream data writes, connected via a 100Gb network interface. There is also a Tiered based approach.

Incentivized

Easy interface and the accessibility of the features are effective and this solution functionalities on data migration and processing of different from other packages is amazing. NetApp AFF A-Series All Flash Arrays is the most secure platform for easy management of all the business and project data and the capacity planning tools and even the configuration options are the best and easy to use.

Incentivized

• Data Replication over long distances using Policy-Based Replication and maintaining the RPO.
• We use snapshot technology heavily and these snaps are easy to create/automate and instantly available.
• Upgrades/Updates are deployed to the system without loss of data or services.
• Sub-millisecond latency is maintained and spikes are handled and absorbed by the system during peaks.
• When connected to the internet via Storage Insights and Cloud Call Home it makes for proactive problem alerting, monitoring and resolution.
• The fact that Replication and snapshot stuff are hidden under the covers and we no longer have to create mirror pairs or flashcopy pairs ourselves. It does it within the cluster or partnership.

Incentivized

• Protective multiple project and business data is excellent.
• Solutions for data storage and data migration.
• Providing useful and quality data reports is effective.

Incentivized

• Drive firmware updates are a bit clunky, the update files have to be sourced manually
• IBM has separate storage monitoring you need to set up to get good historical statistics.
• If you need 8 16Gb ports you will not be able to expand with a SAS connector.

Incentivized

• Cost is still prohibitive for performance.
• Performance tuning at the Fabric Interconnect level.
• Automation and scripting improvements in the PowerShell module.

Incentivized

As flash technology evolves rapidly, vendors should [adapt] to the changes and onboard them in their products. IBM is a bit slow in adopting advanced technology in [its] portfolio. Even though the current product is good, my decision is purely based on how the transformation of the product [is] being produced and supplied to [the] end-user.

Incentivized

It is very flexible, it allows us to hire capacity on demand and also allows IBM to manage my storage, it is a highly recommended product for current needs such as the cloud and containers, without compromising security and performance

Incentivized

Our organizations primary storage platform is NetApp AFF-A900 nodes. All our storage requirements, be it storage visible to our compute either using FC or NFS is through these nodes. The shares or CIFS too are setup on these nodes. We also use the fabric pool to write the data to NetApps Storage Grid

Incentivized

we usually have never had problems with the storage going down, ofcourse there have been disk failures as part of redundancy it works well and didnt have problems with unavailablity.

Incentivized

From an integrative view, IBM Storage FlashSystem provided currently the required performance to support our use cases above and beyond. As one of the most performant solutions, we are pleased to have the IBM Storage FlashSystem supporting our needs of performance as well as scalability within the infrastructure. Not surprisingly, we certainly look forward to scale performance further in the future.

Incentivized

Sometimes the knowledge of the support agent is quite limited and the support always has to route through the level 1 agent to screen all the informtion provided. Then its esclated to the next level support with the all collected data . The logs are always uploaded along wiht the case but still its reviewed at the lower level and then escalated / handed over to the next level if its complex issue to solve.

Incentivized

THe training is often selfpaced and easy to follow if you have worked previously with other storage products. The content is clear and contains all the information needed for an admin to learn. However the troubleshooting part is not always included and this is dependent on forums or other sources where the information is not accessible very easily.

Incentivized

I was amazed by the way IBM Flash storage provides a huge amount of storage within the limited footprint, it helped us to replace big fat storage arrays, which aided in the process of moving towards lower hardware, carbon, and energy consumption footprint. We can comfortably say that Flash helped us to host applications fast with a blazing speed and user transactions are quite quick.

Incentivized

For the past six months, we have been utilizing this technology in our projects to manage a massive workload and produce swift business outcomes on a crucial production database. The IBM FlashSystem 7200, which offers high performance and compression, has so far been a great experience for us. The results and functionality of this product have delighted our consumers.

Incentivized

I have been an IBM and EMC storage customer. I used EMC CX and VMX series SANs. I have used IBM Shark SANs before that. Much has changed over the years. It is my experience that Netapp has shown a great deal more innovation with large leaps in technology, ease of use and an aggressive progress while the two other vendors that I have experience with are more tied to their legacy technologies.

Incentivized

We have been able to scale this storage system whenever there has been requirement for additional capacity and performance. with the help of deduplication we have been able to build quite a robust environment.

Incentivized

• Flash System 5000 Built on a software foundation that delivers a 359% ROI.
• IBM Flash System 5000 Gain the highest levels of availability to support mission-critical applications.
• IBM Flash System 5000 benefits from [the] integration of modern data protection and rich cyber resiliency features.
• IBM Flash System 5000 Enhance storage efficiency.

Incentivized

• ROI has been tremendous as it has come in handy in all the scenarios we were looking at
• Users and admins both happy with the overall performance and management is happy that they got a good deal from reseller.

Incentivized