PowerProtect DD Series vs. Pure Storage FlashBlade

We have huge data coming in from different sources and also from multiple organizations in our Data centres. This data had multiple copies of the same data and was huge in size therefore, we wanted to have a solution in place which can help us with a good amount of deduplication at the deepest possible level to make sure that our ecosystem does not have multiple copies of the same data and is also efficient at the same time. Having said this, we wanted this solution to be secure and reliable since it had to be exposed to a huge critical set of data in the market. To add, backup and restoration was something that we were also keen on evaluating so that once we have efficient data within our system, the time it takes to backup and restoration also reduces. And all this was justified by this solution when we signed up with them. From the pricing perspective and the implementation side, the solution needs improvement to make it more efficient and user-friendly.

Incentivized

If data storage, access, and security [are] of the highest priority to your business then Pure Storage FlashBlade is an excellent tool that must be considered. Analytics or sharing that requires the fastest speeds available will benefit from the NVMe solid-state drives they use which are far superior to spinning rust. It is less ideal for those who do not require such time-critical work.

Incentivized

• It writes backups quickly. DDBoost add-on is very useful as well for improving backup speeds.
• DD is very efficient in its use of capacity. It dedupes and compresses very well.
• It spans to large capacity amounts.

Incentivized

• Speed. We are seeing large transactions take very little time.
• Upgrades- In-place upgrades of both hardware and software are extremely easy.
• Ease of use- I have several engineers working on this and from setup to day to day operations it is extremely easy to maintain.

Incentivized

• It can be expensive to implement, especially when used in conjunction with other applications/hardware such as Avamar.
• The TCO can be high, especially when it needs its storage expanded.
• Recovery speeds can be slow (compared to other solutions) for when recovery is time sensitive.

Incentivized

• When reporting out a user has exceeded there quote, it only references the UID. It would certainly be nice it calls out the UID name that is clearly present in the Dashboard.
• The ability to determine a snapshot total size would be helpful.
• Proactive reachout to discuss new versions and assist in planning the upgrade would be a key win.

Incentivized

DD has performed flawlessly for almost 10 years as our backup/recovery storage with offsite replication. Given its track record and great support from EMC, we're unlikely to look elsewhere any time soon.

Incentivized

Good API, multi-protocol support is great.

Customer support has had some ups and downs here. We've had several issues with EMC support before and during the acquisition by Dell, but in the last 18 months support has been top notch. Quick and knowledgeable help is but a chat away, or they will call you back so you don't have to wait on hold. The team supporting us is responsive and is quick to assist with any request or issue.

Incentivized

Without exception, the contacts with support have been quick and extremely knowledgeable. I do not fear getting an underqualified engineer to assess or work on my arrays. In addition to this support structure, the sales engineers are top notch as well.

Incentivized

We selected Data Domain due to its integration with our backup software. The Data Domain works well for what we need it to do.

Incentivized

The NetApp a800 we tested was 14% faster than Pure FlashBlade with NFS workloads. However, NetApp lacked ease of administration and performing simple tasks such as creating multiple NFS volumes required scripting from the command line. Our flashblade contained 15 baldes and our NetApp was a clustered pair with each half containing 24 nvme devices.

Incentivized

• We were able to immediately discontinue our remote tape storage and TBU maintenance.
• Reduced backup footprint in the data center.
• It is costly to expand so buy it with a purpose.

Incentivized

• We were able to consolidate 5 different storage platforms of lesser performance onto a single Flashblade and achieve much, much lower latency and higher throughput.
• We've been able to reduce the amount of training and configuration required to just Pure Flashblade, instead of 5 different vendors and products.
• In addition to our core use cases, Flashblade has capabilities that we are pursuing for some new projects, i.e. analytics data store and the object store features.

Incentivized