We performed a comparison between NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays and NetApp AFF (All Flash FAS) based on our users’ reviews in four categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison Results: Based on the parameters we compared, NetApp AFF (All Flash FAS) came out ahead of NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays. The two solutions have similar deployment difficulty, price range, and support quality, but NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays has fewer valuable features, according to its users.
"The solution is very straightforward to set up."
"The solution is scalable."
"Pure FlashArray X NVMe helps to improve our processing speed. It is user-friendly and easy to use."
"FlashArray has some fresh efficiency features. I've never seen a storage solution with a compression rating this high before. It's at least 4-to-1 on Oracle databases. It's the best flash storage for Oracle."
"Pure has signature security technology, which cannot be deleted, even if you are an administrator."
"Pure FlashArray X NVMe has low latency and high Ops. It is an evergreen model."
"Pure FlashArray X NVMe will quickly overcome all the hurdles you face, including network and latency issues."
"The standout features for us in Pure FlashArray X NVMe are its robust DDoS protection, seamless transparent failover, and failback capabilities ensuring high availability."
"Its efficiency and scalability are the most valuable features."
"Over the past 18 years, it has been extremely easy to upgrade to newer products and technology. We can upgrade as we move along. So, we have been able to keep up with the newest technology with zero downtime."
"The most valuable feature of AFF is that it offers better visibility and control over performance, ensuring it meets customer needs effectively."
"The benefits of being on AFF are the phenomenal speed at which we're able to ingest data and index it, and the IOPS."
"The Snapshot, SnapMirror, and SnapRestore functionalities."
"It is a stable solution."
"It should scale far beyond our needs. I don't think we will ever hit the edge of it."
"I'm from Germany, so we have lots of metro clusters. The ability to have two sides that are redundant across hundreds or thousands of kilometers is critical for our customers. We have several hundred customers with metro cluster systems, so that is one of the best features."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is its speed."
"This storage solution is both stable and scalable, and it works for our needs."
"The most valuable feature of this solution is the performance of the database access."
"The most valuable feature is the ability to set a specific margin of performance to a specific workload."
"Rapid deployment, easy integration management and cloning of areas."
"The main advantage of this solution is performance."
"The benefits are better up-time, better response time."
"The replication and mirroring features are very good."
"We've seen that when we create a POD in synchronous mode, it increases the latency."
"It is on the expensive side."
"It's more multi-tenant functionality in their Pure1 manage portal that is lacking."
"We would like to see VNC integration or be able to use Pure Storage with VNC."
"In the next release, I would like to see real-time analytics for further insight into consumption models."
"We have run into a couple of instances recently where we are running out of space. So we have had to buy some more packs for it and they have deployed fine and it has increased smoothly."
"The UI for this solution needs to be improved."
"We need better data deduplication."
"They should make these features a little more affordable."
"I really don't have anything to ask for in this regard, because we're not really pushing the envelope on any of our use cases. NetApp is really staying out ahead of all of our needs. I believe that there were firmware issues. I think it was just a mismatch of things that were going on. It could have possibly been something in the deployment process that wasn't done exactly right."
"I would like to see if they could move the virtual storage machines. They have integrated a DR, so you can back to your DR, but there's no automated way to failover and failback. It's all manual. I'd like to see it all automated."
"From my perspective, everything works well. They've already announced that they have some features in their next release that make the existing investment more usable, by adding software features to your existing legacy hardware investment."
"It has not reduced our data center costs. NetApp charges a pretty penny for their stuff."
"It would be great if they had a single pane of glass or a single dashboard where all the NetApp ecosystem storages could be viewed and monitored simply. That would help my Operations."
"I need faster Fibre Channel over Ethernet. They top out at 10GBs today and I would like that to go to 40 or 100."
"When it comes to the cloud, they might need to improve in terms of making it clear why someone would use a NetApp solution over cloud-made storage."
"I would like to shrink it more, if we can. The smaller, the better."
"A little more manageability, a simpler management interface. It's not necessarily that it's way overly complex. It's just that it's not as easy as the FAS series."
"This solution does not have any compression or deduplication."
"I’d like to see bigger, faster, better hardware, of course. I think that is the way the hardware is trending anyway; bigger, faster CPU, better software, fewer bugs, all that stuff. T"
"I've observed an issue when creating a new storage solution with NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays."
"This solution has limited storage."
"The only major drawback is the replication between EF-Series units."
"Their problems are on the software and the controlling of the storage where they lack segmentation and federation."
More NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays Pricing and Cost Advice →
NetApp AFF is ranked 2nd in All-Flash Storage with 280 reviews while NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is ranked 23rd in All-Flash Storage with 38 reviews. NetApp AFF is rated 9.0, while NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is rated 8.6. The top reviewer of NetApp AFF writes "Since switching, our clients have reported improved performance and reduced latency". On the other hand, the top reviewer of NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays writes "A storage solution that offers great stability, resilience, and support". NetApp AFF is most compared with Dell PowerStore, Dell Unity XT, Lenovo ThinkSystem DM Series, Pure Storage FlashArray and VMware vSAN, whereas NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays is most compared with Dell PowerStore, Lenovo ThinkSystem DM Series, Huawei OceanStor Dorado, HPE Primera and IBM FlashSystem. See our NetApp AFF vs. NetApp EF-Series All Flash Arrays report.
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