Nutanix AHV Virtualization Reviews

Nutanix AHV Virtualization is used for the migration from the physical to the virtual.

Nutanix AHV Virtualization has good performance and can be used for backup and disaster.

It would be better if the solution's replication to another site could be efficiently optimized.

I have worked with Nutanix AHV Virtualization since 2015.

Nutanix AHV Virtualization is a stable solution.

Nutanix AHV Virtualization is a very scalable solution. Most of our customers for Nutanix AHV Virtualization are small and medium-level businesses.

The solution’s initial setup is easy.

Around 15 engineers are needed to deploy the solution.

Nutanix AHV Virtualization's Series 1000 is cheaper than other competitors. If you start to use the Series 3000, it'll be the same or sometimes higher. We have to pay a yearly licensing fee for the solution. Clients must pay for another license if they want to use more features.

VMware vSAN is better than Nutanix AHV Virtualization because it improves every year.

The solution's maintenance depends on the project, but I think one person is enough for one cluster.

Before choosing Nutanix AHV Virtualization, users should know their workload.

Overall, I rate Nutanix AHV Virtualization a seven out of ten.

In cloud environments, where you do not know which hypervisor is used, Nutanix allows you to run a hypervisor from Microsoft and VMware, and they offer their hypervisor, which in some respects does have some benefits on the price level and the technology level. We use AHV because we get a broader integrated spectrum of functionality. More performance, less price, and functionalities going up. AHV hypervisor is based on KVM, which is an open-source product. Our clients are from small to enterprise-level customers.

The features I find valuable depending on the client's use cases. If the clients need high-performance storage, we can bypass some layers and be faster. With AHV, you can run micro-segmentation, which is, on the network security level, to have network virtualization across clouds. It's on a cloud data center. Most customers are interested in one aspect. Smaller customers are looking more at the price. Bigger customers are looking at network virtualization or micro-segmentation types of things. They're more attracted to functionalities.

Some companies do not support AHV. Similarly, AHV is not supported on Alibaba and other Chinese clouds.

I've used this solution since it was made available around five years ago.

The product is stable. It is on par with or even better than the hypervisor from VMware.

When discussing AHV, statements such as cloud deployment depend on AOS usage. In this case, AHV is not scalable.

The complete support from Nutanix is outstanding. It's much better than all the other vendors I know of. This might change in the future, but they're providing exceptional support. You're directly connected to a support engineer. The support engineer is working with you on the case. That depends on when you opened the case, and you still might end up in Bangalore with a few problems with Indian English, but these engineers are really good. You can move to another engineer if you'd like, you can escalate, and I've never had a problem with the SLA where they did not react within the agreed time. They're usually faster, good at what they do, and even help you solve problems with products they don't sell, for example, VMware. They know about VMware. Sometimes you have some flaws, but it depends on the people and the communication, which is a rare case.

Positive

The initial setup is straightforward. The deployment for a complete cluster, to hand it over to production, is one or two days.

If you just look at the hardware, you might think this is an expensive solution. Looking at the hardware and the software licenses, too, it might look expensive, but in the end, the return on investment is there. If you build it up on your own using different components, orchestrate the demo, and make the comparison correctly, you will find it is not expensive. The value AHV brings is great. We have received a return on investment with a lot of customers.

There is a benefit gained by nearly all customers in switching to AHV, as AHV offers different benefits. Every customer will find a sweet spot to justify moving away from the existing hypervisor. It is attractive for the client to move. All the customers we know of and have worked with didn't switch back from AHV.

Sometimes we have to run both hypervisors on different clusters because of the software vendor not supporting AHV. Still, you don't have a lot of companies whose software products do not support AHV as a hypervisor. Where they do not support AHV, these are older applications where the software developer tries to reduce complexity, focusing only on one hypervisor, the market leader. But this is changing, and even the cloud challenges software developers because the cloud does not tell you which hypervisor is running in the cloud. They have to move on.

You can deploy the solution on your infrastructure, or you can deploy it onto AWS or Azure. AHV is not supported on GCP. It probably will be in the future.

If your client's business is too small, Nutanix AHV Virtualization might be too expensive. For example, if there's an appliance in an agricultural machine, this might not be the right use case. The smallest use case might be in a small sales office, remote and branch offices, enterprise data centers, and even large companies running multiple SAP HANA enterprise resource planning applications. They're all supported. You can run them on the AHV platform. If your use case is small, and price tag and energy consumption is priority, this is not the solution for you.

There are applications you can't run on this. For example, if you need more than four CPU sockets, and no hardware is supported with more than four CPU sockets, you need a good reason to have your special hardware. There are extreme boundaries to the left and right, but a wide range of use cases can be covered.

AHV is not scalable in the context of AOS usage. I'm mixing the functionality of AOS, which is used in AHV, so I can't separate it. But if you do have enough knowledge, you can say, "Oh, this is based on the functionality that AOS brings and not the functionality that AHV brings." Therefore, it's still okay, but you argue if the statements only focus on AHV.

If you plan on purchasing AHV, you must understand that Nutanix is disruptive. It can't be compared with other solutions. You need to open your mind and look at it without comparing. If you compare it with the solutions you know, you will not move forward because though it is different, it has benefits. You have to have a closer look at it. Nutanix provides storage, an integrated solution, but only 10% of the functionality is storage. If you just reduce it to storage, you're missing 90% of the benefits.

I rate Nutanix AHV Virtualization a ten out of ten.

We majorly use Nutanix AHV Virtualization for server consolidation. 

This product stands out for its user-friendly interface, intuitive design, and responsive UI. It offers AVH features comparable to Nutanix but at a more cost-effective price point.

It should focus on providing more detailed and helpful error messages. One area we'd like to see enhanced is better support for guest VMs, especially in a heterogeneous environment. However, there are no specific additional features that come to mind for the next release.

I have been using Nutanix AHV Virtualization for six years.

It is stable with very few incidents of crashing or requiring reboots. I would rate it 8 out of 10.

It is scalable and would rate it 8 out of 10. Almost 50% of our users use this and belong from medium sized enterprises.

The initial setup can be rated at five. It was more complex compared to other solutions like VMware, which had additional steps such as running foundation and configuring settings.The deployment process involves preparing the hardware, ensuring it's in place, and then following a straightforward process of powering on, rebooting, and installing the necessary components. The preparation phase includes sizing the environment, gathering information about networks, and connections. Once everything is in place, deploying the solution is relatively quick and straightforward, especially when compared to other devices.

I would rate pricing a six out of ten, since it is affordable. The price is fixed but requires additional costs for additional features

I recommend thorough research and understanding of its capabilities before making a decision. Consider your specific needs and, if needed, try the community edition for a proof of concept. Overall, I rate the product an 8/10

Regarding our clusters, we have deployed multiple AOS clusters with the virtualization hypervisor ASV on them, and we are running VMs on it. For the Veeam instances, we are backing up the VMs that are running on Nutanix infrastructure. For that, Veeam has a proxy called ASV proxy, especially for the Nutanix VMs. That's what you deploy on a cluster, and then you are able to take a backup of the VMs.

One of the most valuable aspects is that it is open source. Nutanix has a licensing cost, yet the hypervisor itself does not incur a cost. Additionally, on Nutanix, you have the capability to take snapshots, unlike on VMware. Also, there are the built-in Docker capabilities for replication between clusters, and you do not need different products to support functionalities such as snapshots on Nutanix.

There is an issue with the guest tools, which depend on the storage hypervisor IP. If the communication with NGT were IP-less, it would be more useful since enabling NGT can expose infrastructure details. Nutanix is aware of this and is working on it. Without resolving this, you cannot take application-consistent backups during VMs' snapshots, as NGT is not installed on a VM.

I have five years of experience with this product.

If you're using an LTS release, it's more stable than the short-term support releases (SDS). The LTS is the enterprise release and is more stable.

Nutanix AHV virtualization is easy to scale, and it doesn't impact anything negatively. Scaling is straightforward whenever required.

Support is excellent. The response time is quick compared to other customer support from different vendors. AHV support is the best.

Positive

Before using Nutanix, the organization was using VMware. Cost was a factor in switching, as the licensing cost for VMware was higher. Nutanix provides an all-in-one solution for functionalities like snapshots, which previously required different products on VMware.

While the setup is not complex per se, it requires specific tools for deployment, and some training is necessary. It's not something a layperson can do; some tutorials are needed before deploying Nutanix.

I am not involved in the licensing terms, and I'm not aware of the exact costs associated with Nutanix AHV licensing. Overall, I understand it to be cost-effective compared to VMware.

I would definitely recommend Nutanix to others.

I'd rate the solution eight out of ten.

The solution provides us with a platform to integrate all the hardware products. We can integrate the tool with VMware. Integration is the most valuable feature of the product.

The support must be improved. Other technologies like Dell have their own service centers and different types of SLAs. Nutanix’s support team is not very efficient compared to others.

I resell the solution.

I rate the product’s stability a nine out of ten.

I rate the product’s scalability a nine out of ten.

The initial setup is easy and seamless. The deployment method depends on the customers’ requirements. We can deploy the solution both on the cloud and on-premise. The hardware is on-premise.

The solution’s pricing is relatively fair. It could be improved, though.

I will recommend the tool to others. It is hardware-agnostic and vendor-agnostic. We work with all technologies. The tool provides a platform to integrate all technologies together. Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

We use this solution for server virtualization. It is a good product. 

Nutanix AHV virtualization requires little disk size for a huge number of servers. We can do everything from a single dashboard, monitoring performance, and single-task boxes. It is a very good and excellent product in terms of manageability. We can replicate it to multiple devices at times.

I would like to see better decompression or degrouping of the VMs so that we can use a single number of SQLs with two servers. We don't need a huge number of DXSPs.

The decompression should be better. In my experience with the VMware product, they don't have this type of solution. But we can do it with Nutanix AHV.

In future releases, I would also like to see support for replication with the Centralized Data Reduction (CDR) application. This would allow us to replicate our data to a single dashboard without having to use ASRM or any other third-party solution. It would be a major improvement, and I hope that Nutanix will add this feature in the next version of AHV.

VMware has a decompression function that Nutanix doesn't have, and I would like to see that function added to Nutanix in the next version.

I have been using Nutanix AHV Virtualization for about three years.

I rate the solution’s stability a ten out of ten.

There's no limit, we can have it on multiple servers. Our whole company's employees are using this solution. 

I rate the solution’s scalability a ten out of ten.

The support team is fantastic. We raise a ticket, and they can quickly define the issue and assign it a priority level of 0, 1, 2, or 3. If the issue is fairly high-priority, we get support with a deep view of the problem.

Positive

The initial setup is very simple. There's no complication.

Anyone can easily deploy the solution because it is easy to use. There is no huge learning curve required. 

However, we have about five people for maintenance. 

There is no licensing issue. It is a bundled product with Nutanix.

I rate the solution’s pricing a five out of ten.

We utilize alternative solutions such as VMware or Microsoft. Each of these products comes as a distinct offering, whereas Nutanix AHV comes as a bundled package. 

Upon acquiring a Nutanix system, all necessary components are readily available, eliminating the need for additional APN, networking, or application software like HRA. There's no requirement for supplementary bundled products. This aspect truly sets Nutanix AHV apart as a remarkable and comprehensive solution.

Overall, I rate the solution a ten out of ten.

We use the Nutanix AHV Virtualization solution for production purposes only. We use other solutions for application servers, such as on-premises physical ESX servers.

The most valuable part of Nutanix is its centralized management of everything. You have the storage pool, network pool, storage controller, and processes running inside the Nutanix ZooKeeper, Stargate, and Medusa services. These processes are not inside ESXi, so they must be managed separately.

There is no issue in Nutanix. If one node goes down with any hardware failure, it has a hardware and software host.

Nutanix misses alerts sometimes. To improve this, Nutanix should integrate with Eskom, an existing monitoring tool. This would allow Nutanix to receive alerts from Eskom instead of having to install and configure its monitoring tool. This would be a great feature, as it would allow Nutanix to receive alerts for all physical devices and processes, even if Nutanix itself does not manage them.

I have been using Nutanix AHV Virtualization for three years. We are using the latest version of the solution.

The product's stability is good.

AHV virtualization is scalable, with enhanced security features. One thousand five hundred users are using this solution in our organization.

The customer support is good.

Positive

The initial setup is easy. If you are unboxing Nutanix appliances from the storage and need to install the entire cluster, it will take at least two to three days to install, configure, and migrate virtual machines from ESXi to AHV.

The product is costly and comes with an annual subscription. There are other solutions like Cisco UCS, vSAN, and Azure Stack. Azure Stack is a particularly significant competitor, as it is cheaper than Nutanix.

Instead of creating a storage account and configuring other things, you should be able to create a cloud cluster, deploy it, remove it, and migrate VMs from on-premises to the cloud and vice versa, all within Prism Central in a user-friendly way. You should work more on AWS, GCP, Azure, and Kubernetes integration and services. You can deploy Kubernetes services inside the Nutanix AHV hypervisor.

Instead of creating a new system, I think improving the existing Nutanix AHV Virtualization KB document would be more helpful. The KB document has a lot of information, but finding specific solutions to problems can be difficult. For example, if you install a KB fix and an application stops working, you may have to read many documents to find the solution. This can be lengthy, and raising a ticket with Nutanix may be necessary. Finding the needed information would be easier if the KB document were better organized and structured.

If you need a protection database server, I recommend Nutanix. It is very fast. However, if you run applications, Nutanix is not the best choice. Other products in the market are better suited for applications.

Overall, I rate the solution a seven out of ten.

From a hypervisor perspective, AHV appears promising. However, some enhanced features, like fault tolerance compared to VMware and template management, seem to lack user-friendliness. While performing tasks in AHV is possible, the process can be cumbersome. Users often find themselves navigating through multiple interfaces and resorting to command-line actions. Although AHV functions adequately as a hypervisor, improving its user interface and streamlining features like template management would greatly enhance the user experience.

The significant advantage lies in its storage policies. With AHV, we can create multiple containers and apply distinct policies to each underlying storage container. Additionally, AHV employs a concept of core tier and core tier data, ensuring that frequently accessed data is readily available, even in hybrid environments. Unlike other systems like AHV Excel, AHV doesn't separate cache and capacity drives, leading to faster data read speeds. This streamlined approach contrasts with solutions like Dell EMC.

Nutanix has Prism, which offers numerous capabilities. Unlike VMware, we don't require additional monitoring tools. We often rely on VMware for monitoring, logging, capacity planning, and analysis. However, all these features are available within Prism. Additionally, one-click upgrades for all components are available within Nutanix AHV. Similar features are also available in Dell EMC VxRail.

The lack of public documentation makes it difficult to implement available solutions efficiently. While generic information is accessible, specific problem-solving documentation is lacking. For instance, millions of KB articles are readily available with Dell or VMware, facilitating swift issue resolution even before consulting official support channels. However, finding straightforward answers for Nutanix-related issues proves challenging. Therefore, increasing KB publishing and public documentation would greatly benefit users, particularly by focusing on specific problems rather than general product information. Like VMware's community, Nutanix could enhance its community platform to provide readily available answers. While Nutanix might have the potential for such initiatives, they are not as prominently exposed as their counterparts.

When a customer considering Nutanix as a VMware alternative wishes to migrate to Nutanix but finds that it does not support external storage, this presents a significant roadblock for customers contemplating moving away from their current infrastructure, especially if they heavily rely on external storage. However, it would have significantly improved if Nutanix had addressed this issue. AHV is indeed a viable option. Additionally, if Nutanix enhances its SDN capabilities, particularly in areas such as VPN connectivity and load balancing features, it could become an even more attractive alternative to VMware for those looking to transition from a VMware-based data center to a Nutanix-based one.

I have been using Nutanix AHV Virtualization as a partner.

For one of our customers, let me provide a live example. The customer was using NFS as an external file storage solution. However, by embracing the native functionality of AHV file services, they could remove the external file servers from their environment. They utilized the native feature set of Nutanix, mainly the AHV file services managed remotely. In another scenario, a different customer initially used external storage with their Windows clusters after migrating workloads from VMware vSphere. However, when it comes to AHV, it offers its own volumes or block storage feature.

Consequently, they no longer relied on external storage but utilized the internally provided storage. Especially noteworthy is the ease of migration facilitated by Nutanix Prism. Unlike many other hypervisors, with Nutanix, there's no need for additional migration tools or costs. This aspect presents significant cost savings when transitioning to Nutanix from different platforms. These examples underscore the value proposition of Nutanix AHV, particularly in terms of cost savings and leveraging its native capabilities, which eliminate the need for additional external costs.

When utilizing Nutanix AHV virtualization, especially when seeking optimization for our workloads and the best performance, it's essential to place IBM on the host properly. Typically, when AOCs are overloaded, and AHVOCs are less overloaded, but we aren't achieving the expected performance for the VM region, diagnosis is necessary. If the host lacks the resources to supply to the VM, AHV will automatically balance the workload across multiple nodes.

Nutanix offers two key advantages. Firstly, it provides native snapshot features, significantly reducing the need for additional backup solutions. These snapshots efficiently back up VMs to local storage, simplifying the backup process. Secondly, Nutanix excels in metro cluster capabilities, allowing seamless workload protection across two Nutanix sites. In the event of a failure at one site, VMs are automatically restarted on the secondary site, ensuring continuity of operations. Additionally, Nutanix boasts native DR capabilities, eliminating the need for additional expenditure. Whether customers are utilizing on-premises Nutanix clusters or extending their environment to Nutanix on AWS or Azure, they can easily establish DR setups by configuring initial connectivity via IP, VPN, or similar means to safeguard their workloads.

Overall, I rate the solution an eight out of ten.