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CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform vs Nasuni comparison

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Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive SummaryUpdated on Dec 3, 2024

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

ROI

Sentiment score
7.2
IBM Turbonomic offers quick ROI by reducing hardware costs, optimizing resources, and decreasing operational expenses through automation and efficiency.
Sentiment score
7.2
CTERA Enterprise File Services reduced costs and time, minimized manual storage, and eliminated SSD and alternative storage needs.
Sentiment score
7.5
Nasuni users enjoy cost savings, increased productivity, and efficiency from reduced labor, cloud scalability, and improved data management.
Adding SSD storage to Windows file servers is expensive, and we no longer need to back up those devices.
I am positive that CTERA has helped reduce the total cost of ownership by eliminating the need for manual storage management and reducing storage service processes.
 

Customer Service

Sentiment score
8.9
IBM Turbonomic's customer service is highly rated for its responsiveness, knowledge, and effectiveness, despite some mixed post-acquisition experiences.
Sentiment score
8.3
CTERA's platform provides responsive support, rated highly for proactive assistance and efficient issue resolution by knowledgeable agents.
Sentiment score
8.2
Nasuni's customer service is praised for responsiveness and professionalism, efficiently solving issues with reliable and knowledgeable support.
They swiftly address concerns and take ownership of the call, providing a very satisfactory support experience.
High-priority issues are handled promptly.
I would rate their support a ten out of ten.
 

Scalability Issues

Sentiment score
6.9
IBM Turbonomic is scalable, seamlessly integrating with various environments while its licensing supports expansion, focusing on additional requirements.
Sentiment score
8.3
CTERA's platform is scalable and easy to expand globally, though CPU and memory licensing constraints may pose challenges.
Sentiment score
7.3
Nasuni offers scalable, user-friendly data storage, efficiently meeting diverse organizational needs and supporting physical or virtual deployments.
If we need to upgrade CPU and memory, we should be able to do that without a license upgrade.
CTERA is a very scalable product, allowing us to grow.
It offers good scalability options, including vertical and outward scalability.
I rated the scalability as seven because even though the solution can scale, load balancing must be done manually, as it's not automated.
 

Stability Issues

Sentiment score
7.4
IBM Turbonomic is praised for stability and robust performance, with minor update issues swiftly resolved by support.
Sentiment score
7.5
CTERA's platform faced initial bugs but improved over time, earning high stability ratings with reliable data access.
Sentiment score
8.2
Nasuni is praised for its stability, offering reliable performance, minimal maintenance, and flexibility with virtually no downtime issues.
It has been pretty stable since then.
We had things deployed for years, and we were suddenly getting cloud sync issues that were crashing our sites.
It is very stable and reliable.
 

Room For Improvement

IBM Turbonomic needs an improved interface, better reporting, clearer documentation, more integrations, and a stable, mobile-compatible platform.
The CTERA platform needs improvements in monitoring, updates, UI, logging, and performance, while users value current features and support.
Nasuni struggles with cloud integration, performance, and user experience, needing improvements in data retention, security, and analytics.
AI and automation features could enhance the platform, such as AI-powered search, predictive storage analytics, and intelligent alerts for proactive monitoring.
It would help to have a global single-pane-of-glass view of all my CTERA devices.
One suggested improvement for the CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform is the ability to distribute data across multiple active backend storage nodes rather than the current limitation of a single active node.
I suggest Nasuni improve their syslog forwarders to support TCP protocol, as it's more secure than UDP, which is plain text and not protected at all.
 

Setup Cost

IBM Turbonomic offers flexible, competitive pricing models, providing value through resource optimization and reducing hardware expenses effectively.
CTERA offers cost-effective enterprise file services with flexible licensing, providing significant savings over EMC and Nasuni, especially in Israel.
Nasuni offers competitive pricing with flexible cloud compatibility, licensing per terabyte, and cost-effective enterprise solutions.
Unlike other solutions that require hardware purchases, CTERA offers software licensing with flexibility across multiple infrastructure providers.
CTERA's pricing seems to be on par with some of the other players, such as Nasuni and Azure.
I find the pricing reasonable.
I prefer solutions with lower pricing.
 

Valuable Features

IBM Turbonomic enhances efficiency through automation, capacity management, reporting, and planning, optimizing resource allocation and infrastructure decisions.
CTERA excels in scalability, flexibility, data management, and protection, making it ideal for hybrid cloud and remote work environments.
Nasuni provides scalable cloud-based file management with global file locking, data security, and efficient disaster recovery features.
As soon as something is written to the device, CTERA copies it to the cloud, where it's versioned with snapshots so we can recover it.
A vital advantage of this platform is its instantaneous recovery capability, allowing seamless access to a secondary gateway if the primary one fails.
It is a three-in-one solution for us. It is a file-sharing platform, an archiving solution, and also a backup solution.
The features I find most valuable in Nasuni are the unlimited snapshots, antivirus capabilities, auditing, and ransomware protection.
 

Categories and Ranking

IBM Turbonomic
Sponsored
Ranking in Cloud Migration
5th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
205
Ranking in other categories
Cloud Management (4th), Virtualization Management Tools (4th), IT Financial Management (1st), IT Operations Analytics (4th), Cloud Analytics (1st), Cloud Cost Management (1st), AIOps (5th)
CTERA Enterprise File Servi...
Ranking in Cloud Migration
7th
Average Rating
9.2
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
9
Ranking in other categories
File System Software (2nd), NAS (9th), Cloud Storage (10th), Cloud Backup (12th), Disaster Recovery (DR) Software (8th), Cloud Storage Gateways (2nd), Content Collaboration Platforms (12th)
Nasuni
Ranking in Cloud Migration
4th
Average Rating
8.8
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
36
Ranking in other categories
File System Software (1st), NAS (7th), Cloud Storage (3rd), Cloud Backup (13th), Disaster Recovery (DR) Software (9th), Cloud Storage Gateways (1st)
 

Featured Reviews

Keldric Emery - PeerSpot reviewer
Saves time and costs while reducing performance degradation
It's been a very good solution. The reporting has been very, very valuable as, with a very large environment, it's very hard to get your hands on the environment. Turbonomic does that work for you and really shows you where some of the cost savings can be done. It also helps you with the reporting side. Me being able to see that this machine hasn't been used for a very long time, or seeing that a machine is overused and that it might need more RAM or CPU, et cetera, helps me understand my infrastructure. The cost savings are drastic in the cloud feature in Azure and in AWS. In some of those other areas, I'm able to see what we're using, what we're not using, and how we can change to better fit what we have. It gives us the ability for applications and teams to see the hardware and how it's being used versus how they've been told it's being used. The reporting really helps with that. It shows which application is really using how many resources or the least amount of resources. Some of the gaps between an infrastructure person like myself and an application are filled. It allows us to come to terms by seeing the raw data. This aspect is very important. In the past, it was me saying "I don't think that this application is using that many resources" or "I think this needs more resources." I now have concrete evidence as well as reporting and some different analytics that I can show. It gives me the evidence that I would need to show my application owners proof of what I'm talking about. In terms of the downtime, meantime, and resolution that Turbonomic has been able to show in reports, it has given me an idea of things before things happen. That is important as I would really like to see a machine that needs resources, and get resources to it before we have a problem where we have contention and aspects of that nature. It's been helpful in that regard. Turbonomic has helped us understand where performance risks exist. Turbonomic looks at my environment and at the servers and even at the different hosts and how they're handling traffic and the number of machines that are on them. I can analyze it and it can show me which server or which host needs resources, CPU, or RAM. Even in Azure, in the cloud, I'm able to see which resources are not being used to full capacity and understand where I could scale down some in order to save cost. It is very, very helpful in assessing performance risk by navigating underlying causes and actions. The reason why it's helpful is because if there's a machine that's overrunning the CPU, I can run reports every week to get an idea of machines that would need CPU, RAM, or additional resources. Those resources could be added by Turbonomic - not so much by me - on a scheduled basis. I personally don't have to do it. It actually gives me a little bit of my life back. It helps me to get resources added without me physically having to touch each and every resource myself. Turbonomic has helped to reduce performance degradation in the same way as it's able to see the resources and see what it needs and add them before a problem occurs. It follows the trends. It sees the trends of what's happening and it's able to add or take away those resources. For example, we discuss when we need to do certain disaster recovery tests. Over the years, Turbo will be able to see, for example, around this time of year that certain people ramp up certain resources in an environment, and then it will add the resources as required. Another time of year, it will realize these resources are not being used as much, and it takes those resources away. In this way, it saves money and time while letting us know where we are. We've saved a great deal of time using this product when I consider how I'd have to multiply myself and people like me who would have to add resources to devices or take resources away. We've saved hundreds of hours. Most of the time those hours would have to be after hours as well, which are more valuable to me as that's my personal time. Those saved hours are across months, not years. I would consider the number of resources that Turbonomic is adding and taking away and the placement (if I had to do it all myself) would end up being hundreds of hours monthly that would be added without the help of Turbonomic. It helps us to meet SLAs mainly due to the fact that we're able to keep the servers going and to keep the servers in an environment, to keep them to where (if we need to add resources) we can add them at any given time. It will keep our SLAs where they need to be. If we were to have downtime due to the fact that we had to add resources or take resources away and it was an emergency, then that would prevent us from meeting our SLAs. We also use it to monitor Azure and to monitor our machines in terms of the resources that are out there and the cost involved. In a lot of cases, it does a better job of giving us cost information than Azure itself does. We're able to see the cost per machine. We're able to see the unattached volume and storage that we are paying for. It gives us a great level of insight. Turbonomic gives us the time to be able to focus on innovation and ongoing modernization. Some of the tasks that it does are tasks that I would not necessarily have to do. It's very helpful in that I know that the resources are there where they need to be and it gives me an idea of what changes need to be made or what suggestions it's making. Even if I don't take them, I'm able to get a good idea of some best practices through Turbonomic. One of the ways that Turbonomic does to help bring new resources to market is that we are now able to see the resources (or at least monitor the resources) before they get out to the general public within our environment. We saw immediate value from the product in the test environment. We set it up in a small test environment and we started with just placement and we could tell that the placement was being handled more efficiently than what VMware was doing. There was value for us in placement alone. Then, after we left the placement, we began to look at the resources and there were resources. We immediately began to see a change in the environment. It has made the application and performance better, mainly due to the fact that we are able to give resources and take resources away based on what the need is. Our expenses, definitely, have been in a better place based on the savings that we've been able to make in the cloud and on-prem. Turbonomic has been very helpful in that regard. We've been able to see the savings easily based on the reports in Turbonomic. That, and just seeing the machines that are not being used to capacity allows us to set everything up so it runs a bit more efficiently.
Igal Muginstein - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers flexibility, fast performance, and ransomware protection
The platform is releasing new features at a fast pace, which sometimes leads to version updates every three to six months. Although updates are generally not complex, it is challenging to stop the production environment during these updates, even if the downtime is just a few minutes. This is a common challenge across all NAS providers. From my perspective, the most important area for improvement is developing a method to perform updates without affecting customer production environments. Additionally, there are some cache size limitations that might become problematic for future use cases, though they don’t impact current applications. Collaboration for NFS and SMB protocols could also be enhanced. Although this issue isn't specific to CTERA, it is something we are working on together to improve. The quality of the versions has improved, but occasional issues still arise. All solutions face this challenge, but we hope to see a continued reduction in the number of bugs. That said, we haven't had any major production problems in the last four years, and we appreciate how responsive CTERA is to our issues. We engage in brainstorming sessions together, and we value this relationship.
Richard McGregor - PeerSpot reviewer
Removes a lot of infrastructure, allows us to restore files instantly, and is simple to work with
I particularly like the restore process. Our financial teams make changes to spreadsheets and other files, and we've got teams using Photoshop files. They make mistakes and need to recover files, and we can do that instantly. We also have users who manage to delete folders, and we can bring them back instantly within a few seconds. Knowing that it's all protected from ransomware is also a very big advantage at the moment with the number of ransomware attacks that you see out there. Nasuni is being very protective of that, which is quite good to hear. There were times when we had to replace the filers we've had issues with, and because we know all our data is protected in AWS, we could just turn them off and spin them up. As quickly as in an hour or so, we were back working with zero downtime. That area of functionality is really good. In terms of ease of management, it's the easiest one you can use. It's very simple. It's very easy to set up, very easy to configure, and very easy to manage.
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Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
14%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Insurance Company
7%
Computer Software Company
70%
Financial Services Firm
5%
Educational Organization
4%
University
3%
Computer Software Company
17%
Manufacturing Company
10%
Financial Services Firm
9%
Construction Company
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Turbonomic?
It offers different scenarios. It provides more capabilities than many other tools available. Typically, its price is...
What needs improvement with Turbonomic?
The implementation could be enhanced.
What is your primary use case for Turbonomic?
We use IBM Turbonomic to automate our cloud operations, including monitoring, consolidating dashboards, and reporting...
What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform?
I am not directly involved in the pricing aspects, but I understand that CTERA's pricing is competitive and within in...
What needs improvement with CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform?
One area for improvement is the migration tool, which at times does not work as designed, necessitating the use of al...
What is your primary use case for CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform?
We use it as a hosted cloud solution. We had initially tried Azure File Sync, but that did not work. Due to certain s...
Does Nasuni have a good pricing model?
Based on the experience of my organization, Nasuni is definitely worth the money, since it gives you an all-in-one so...
Is it easy to restore files with Nasuni?
As someone who has used this feature of Nasuni I can tell you - yes, it's good for file recovery and you'll definitel...
What features and services does Nasuni offer?
Hi, if you pick Nasuni, you'll be benefiting from many services for a good price. Well, it's a personalized price you...
 

Also Known As

Turbonomic, VMTurbo Operations Manager
No data available
No data available
 

Interactive Demo

Demo not available
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

IBM, J.B. Hunt, BBC, The Capita Group, SulAmérica, Rabobank, PROS, ThinkON, O.C. Tanner Co.
McDonald's, WPP, US Navy, Gore, Festo, Stryker, Bezeq, PERI
American Standard, CBRE, Cushman & Wakefield, E*TRADE, Ithaca Energy, McLaren Construction, Morton Salt, Movado, Urban Outfitters, Western Digital
Find out what your peers are saying about CTERA Enterprise File Services Platform vs. Nasuni and other solutions. Updated: April 2025.
848,576 professionals have used our research since 2012.