Home / What is my storage array worth?
Arrays are the most commonly misjudged thing in any rack — in both directions. A shelf of disks can be worth more than the controllers that drove it, and a headline model number tells you almost nothing.
Servers are relatively easy to value: one box, one specification, one figure. A storage array is not one product. It is four things that are priced separately, and the balance between them varies enormously from platform to platform.
1. The controllers (heads / nodes) · 2. The expansion shelves · 3. The disks inside them · 4. The licensing — which usually does not come with any of the above
Get those four separated in your head and everything else about array value follows.
The instinct is that the controllers are the array, and the shelves are accessories. Commercially it is frequently the other way round.
Controllers are the part most tied to a specific platform, a specific software version and — critically — a specific licence. A controller pair that cannot be licensed by its next owner is worth a fraction of what its original price suggests. Shelves and disks, by contrast, are far more portable, far easier to resell and much less encumbered.
This is why we always want the shelves and disks itemised separately on your list, rather than "one array". Two lines on a list can be worth several times what one line implies.
This is the single biggest difference between selling a server and selling an array, and almost nobody explains it before the valuation lands.
Enterprise storage software is generally node-locked: the licence is issued against the serial number of a specific controller and is valid only on that controller. It is not a property of the box you are selling — it is a contract between the vendor and you.
None of that stops us buying the hardware, and none of it is your problem to solve. But it is why an array with a large original invoice value can price modestly on the used market, and why an honest buyer will not quote you from a model number alone.
If a buyer gives you a confident figure for a storage array from the model number alone, without asking about shelves, disk population or controller serials, they are either guessing or quoting the number they expect to renegotiate later.
Array disks are often not ordinary disks, and the differences change what they are worth to the next owner.
The clearest example is NetApp, which formats drives at 520 bytes per sector — 512 bytes of data plus 8 bytes of checksum — rather than the standard 512. Those drives will not simply drop into a non-NetApp system. They can be reformatted to 512, but that is an extra step that a buyer prices in, so a NetApp-formatted drive is worth less than the same physical drive in standard format.
Array drives usually sit in platform-specific carriers, and are frequently running vendor firmware that ties them to that platform. A drive in the right carrier with the right firmware is straightforward to resell; the same drive loose, without its carrier, is a different and lesser proposition.
The practical advice is the same as with servers, only more so: leave the drives in their carriers, and leave the carriers in the shelf. Stripping an array down to loose components before valuation almost always reduces the total.
Exactly as with servers, this is your commercial decision and it changes the figure either way. Tell us when you send the list whether the disks are staying with the shelves or being kept back, so the valuation reflects what is actually being collected.
Itemise it — controllers, shelves, and disks as separate lines with quantities. It is the single biggest thing you can do to get an accurate figure, and it usually works in your favour.
Get my priceThe FAS hybrid line and the AFF all-flash line, plus the expansion shelves that go with them — DS2246 and DS4246 on SAS, the denser DS212C and DS224C, and NS224 on NVMe. Shelves hold their value notably well and are worth listing separately from the heads. Note the IOM module type (IOM6 versus IOM12) if you can see it, as it dates the shelf and affects what it can be used with.
A wide range with very different value profiles: PowerVault at the entry end, Unity and Unity XT in the midrange, PowerStore as the current platform, and the older VNX and Compellent/SC families which are now well past. PowerScale/Isilon nodes and PowerMax are specialist and worth asking about individually rather than assuming.
MSA at the entry end, Nimble and 3PAR StoreServ in the midrange, and Alletra as the current line. The 3PAR platform in particular is heavily licence-dependent, so controller and node detail matters more than usual. StoreOnce is a different proposition again and should be listed separately rather than lumped in with primary storage.
FlashArray and FlashBlade. Pure's Evergreen model means controllers are upgraded in place over the life of a subscription, so what is physically in your rack may not map neatly onto how the platform was originally sold. Worth a conversation rather than an assumption — send us the model and we will tell you where it stands.
Storwize and FlashSystem, plus the various OEM-badged versions of the same platforms. Send the model and we will look at it.
The more of this you have, the tighter the figure. None of it is compulsory:
If that is more detail than you have, send a photo of the front and rear of the rack. Arrays are usually identifiable from the shelf fronts and the rear controller layout, and we would rather work it out from a picture than have you guess.
Send us the list. You'll have a written per-unit valuation back within one working day.
Get my price