Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) Reviews

One of the most beneficial features that a customer would get from this solution is simplicity and ease of use. Another major benefit is the simplified licensing, where you can buy based on your needs. The third benefit is definitely since it's a leader in its technology, people have the comfort of depending on that technology for their critical business models.

There are a few improvements needed to make the solution better. There are some limitations on the hard add side when you are planning to add more memory or CPU on a running machine already removing something. That's something that is still lax. 

The second thing is compatibility. Nutanix is compatible with third-party hardware, but it's still very limited, and it's not very flexible on that side. Give people the ability to reuse whatever investment they have down the hardware. The other HCI providers are a bit flexible on that side, so that's a negative side of Nutanix right now.

We have had a partnership with Nutanix for one year.

There is no limit to the scalability of the solution. With Nutanix, when it comes to expanding or scaling up your requirements, be it horizontally scaling up, or even if you have more services, maybe vertical scale-up, it's very, very simple.

The solution takes a few hours to deploy, and we finish it in a three node cluster, within four to five hours. That's maximum.

We deploy the solution to the customer, and we provide support after deployment.

In terms of the solution's licensing, it's quite comprehensive. You have a combination of picking and choosing what exactly you're looking at. Customers can reduce their costs and buy the licensing based on their needs, rather than just buying everything together.

It's about quality as well as commercially. The solution is not cheap. Compared to its competitive market, it is at a higher stake.

The solution is a high-end product. Depending on what you are using it for, it can be very simple. However, if you have a complex environment, you may need to subscribe to a consulting service.

Nutanix gives you good comfort to not only create a private cloud but also gives you the ability to manage the public cloud instances from a single console. Simplicity is very, very important, and I think Nutanix gives you that comfort when you do the right sizing and implementation.

It feels like plug and play like you're adding a mouse or a USB to a laptop. It's that simple.

I would rate the solution an eight out of ten.

Nutanix Acropolis AOS is flexible and has helped people to work from home during the pandemic.

The productivity and work efficiency of Nutanix Acropolis AOS could improve.

In the future, the solution could improve by having more cloud features.

I have been using Nutanix Acropolis AOS for two and a half years.

Nutanix Acropolis AOS has been stable.

I have found Nutanix Acropolis AOS to be scalable.

We have approximately 400 users using this solution in my organization.

We have never had any major critical issues, we have not had the need to use the support. 

I have previously used VxRail and it is very similar to Nutanix Acropolis AOS.

The initial setup was client-based and it was easy.

The cost of Nutanix Acropolis AOS is reasonable.

By deploying this solution you will receive the best results compared to other HCI solutions.

I rate Nutanix Acropolis AOS an eight out of ten.

I meet many customers on a weekly basis and there has been always one common question in almost every meeting. Which HCI Solution is the Best for me?

in order to be able to answer this question, I had studied many HCI solutions in the Market and deeply analyzed the Pros & Cons of all major solutions.

The HyperScale Architecture which Nutanix adopted from day one is a game-changer, it enabled my customers to scale with no limits & give them their freedom back by avoiding Hardware & Hypervisors locking.

- Support Calls are being answered directly by L3 Support team who are capable to solve not only Acropolis issue but hypervisor as well. 

- One-Click Updates.

- One Management Console for Cluster Management ( Compute, Storage ) and VMs operations as well.

- Storage Only Nodes.

- Having multiple HW Vendors & Hypervisors in the same Data centre and manage all with one management tool.

having more integrations with security vendors to be able to introduce more Virtual Load Balancers and Virtual Firewalls.

I have been using Nutanix Acropolis for three years.

It's the most stable infrastructure we had ever proposed.

Customers love the Nutanix experience and keep on adding more nodes to cover more business needs.

It's the only solution that can scale properly — there is no limitation on the number of nodes that a customer can have in the same cluster.

Customers can expand at any time the storage layer by adding just storage nodes, which will not only expand the capacity but also will enhance the performance as each node comes with something called a virtual controller. So scalability-wise, we're only expanding the storage with no obligation to pay for additional hypervisors license. 

Their support is amazing. When we open a support ticket, there are always level-three engineers who respond to your calls. What I also love about the support is that whenever we open a call, usually it gets routed to the last engineer who already knows our environment. The support is Amazing.

The initial setup is very easy. It didn't take more than three days to implement this solution.

Never lock your self with a specific vendor.

if you are considering vXRail, for example, you need to pay attention that you will be locked in so financially speaking if you have an expansion, you can do it with Dell only leaving no space for healthy pricing competition & don't be surprised if they don't give you the same initial discount because simply you are already locked in! 

& The same goes for VMware, you would be locked in with VMware only. VMware license nowadays is not cheap, it's costly so eventually, you will find your annual spending are exceeding your budget and you no option but to buy from them.

If you are a new customer to Nutanix start with a Cloud Bundle; they are very cost-effective and they can fit any requirement.

Cisco HyperFlex

Dell vXRail

Hp Simplivity

Always go for AHV Option because VMware is costly, especially if you're considering not only the hypervisor cost but considering vRealize Operations, Automation and NSX on top.

Nutanix will help you to wave out the hypervisor TAX which is not less than 20 % of any infrastructure initial setup cost 

We started using Nutanix recently. I'm working here in Muscat, Oman and I take care of a complete data center, the managing, security, and maintenance. We deployed Nutanix recently with the help of Entech. Entech is the main vendor here in Muscat. In that setup, we are using the VMA 6.5 as well as 6. The primary use is for node clusters. We are reviewing the Nutanix servers now.

We use Nutanix Acropolis to look after the cluster, the migration, etc. and run the data center. We have around 300 users here using it. 

We deployed a basic setup, then afterward one-by-one, we re-migrated the servers. 

Only four people are needed to deploy Nutanix Acropolis and maintain it. I'm the main keeper for maintaining the original deployment and everything I must do. 

At a cost level, it compared well with the other vendors. Nutanix is very costly compared to others, even HP but, it works very well. 

We recommend Nutanix to the management because of scalability and time efficiency. These advantages aim at the next level of relationship for our current management, then we'll decide on future deployments.

Nutanix helped us to install hardware and taught us how to deploy with a reset. We learned how to install the Nutanix OS, and run a network.

The storage and back-up facilities could be improved. The storage and recording back-up for updates where we can maintain the data server and handle an insurance company. 

We need day-to-day encrypting of the database. We're purchasing Acropolis and Veritas. That is a big headache. We are using Nutanix for backup and storage purposes. That is now going well in terms of storage and backup.

The cloud base is an extra feature. It should be the standard. Nutanix Cloud is not that helpful for us.

The stability is good. It's time efficient compared to Dell and HP servers. Compared to those companies the stability is very good. 

Once you start the server, use the boot manual for very user-friendly options.

The main scalability is time-efficiency. If you are conserving your data, this kind of scalability and performance is very good.

For technical support, we're not in contact with them. We get the information online. You can search to get to the solution.

Before we were using Mascot. Then we started with Nutanix.

The initial setup is straightforward and not complex. It is easy. It's the firewall only. Initial deployment takes less time. We have around four data centers here. 

Starting up takes around two days, plan for an extra day per data center.

The vendors, Entech, gave very good training to us. I did that one myself.

We evaluated many solutions but finally went with this one. We went with Dell. That is a portable device. We found this one to be better.

I would recommend Nutanix Acropolis. We are a national insurance company here. We require scalability. Nutanix is very good at whatever the scale is. There are no headaches. You can boot-up other servers, all in one.

On a scale from one to ten, I would rate Nutanix Acropolis a nine. I would go to 10, but many features are not perfect. 

HQ datacenter workload plus branch offices local datacenter (including small file sharing on Windows VM).

Nutanix simplified administration efforts dramatically and increased the performances of some mission-critical applications.

• One-click upgrade
• Data locality for performances
• Prism central administration console
• Metro availbility.

• Price politics sometimes is not very transparent for the worldwide organization. 
• Better value for money about file share feature
• We feel that the cost for capacity is still more expensive compared to other solutions.

We're using Acropolis as our own cloud platform. FutureTech, my company, has built a cloud which is called Jute Cloud and is offering services to customers in Kuwait, Bahrain, and in Jordan as well. We are offering infrastructure as a service, backup as a service, DR as a service, security as a service. All of that is based on Nutanix Acropolis.

In terms of performance, it is outstanding.

The TCO model of Nutanix is much more mature than other solutions, because everything is consolidated. We're getting the best value for our investments. We're able to build cost-effective solutions, so it helps us to generate better revenue, and better margins as well.

Flexibility. We're able to mix performance nodes with storage nodes easily. Unlike other vendors where, if we start a hyperconverged solution with them, we have to stick to a specific model, to a specific series with specific capabilities, with Nutanix it's very easy to mix and match the best solution, especially for a dynamic infrastructure like ours.

It would be fantastic if there was a built-in layer, in Nutanix, that acted like a cloud interface. So far, we need to integrate a cloud interface on top of Nutanix for billing the usage for specific customers' domains. It would be great if a cloud gateway was built-in, inside Nutanix.

Also, one of the very important things that I would like to see in Nutanix, but I'm not sure if it's in the roadmap or not, is to have some kind of caching optimization at remote sites, to build active-active data centers more easily.

The stability is really outstanding.

One of my biggest customers worldwide is called Agility and they have distributed data centers around the world. In my first meeting, I asked the IT Manager there, "Okay, so what do you think about Nutanix's stability?" He said, "You know what? My only problem with Nutanix is that it's very stable, so I don't know how my engineers, if one day they face a problem, will fix it, because it's very stable, unlike other vendors." 

We literally put the appliance in production, and we forget about it. It's a very stable environment. More than 70 percent of my sales are coming from existing customers. Customers start with a small workload and then they add more workloads because they find the platform very stable and they can depend on it. They can add more workloads to it. And they even refer the technology to other customers as well.

No other vendor in the market today has the scalability options that Nutanix has. We're able to mix different models, different capacity models, different performance models. It can do all of that. Other vendors cannot do that.

The support is very good, because whenever we have a support ticket, even from the virtualization layer, all we need to do is open one ticket with Nutanix, and they solve all of our problems related to hardware or related to hypervisor. We love that because it helps us to maintain our SLAs.

They are very responsive.

We switched to Nutanix Acropolis, because of the 3D architecture. The old architecture has a lot of disadvantages. For example, whenever there is a support ticket that needs to be opened, we used to check with the software manufacturers, and they would point fingers at the hypervisor layer or the virtualization software, so we would have to go open a ticket again with the virtualization vendor. Then, they would say, "No, maybe it's the storage." Then the storage guy would say, "No, maybe it's the SAN switch, not the storage," and we would keep on cycling.

With Nutanix, the best thing is that they support the whole solution. We're getting just one appliance.

One more issue was the storage itself. Regardless of how big the investment was - we could increase the capacity of the storage as much as we wanted - the problem remained in the IOPS. We found a very good solution for this in Nutanix, because whenever we're adding new appliances, not only are we increasing the capacity, but we're also increasing the performance. This is the best solution, especially for a dynamic workload.

Our most important criteria when selecting a vendor are 

• support
• having a decent roadmap
• R&D.

Those are the most important factors. I put support first because maybe they have a very good technical solution but the support is very weak. That would be a very big problem for me, and production. And a vendor that is investing in R&D, it makes a lot of sense for me to use them.

I evaluated Cisco HyperFlex. It was very weak. We also compared EMC2. They have a hyperconverged solution, but I don't remember what its name was. We also evaluated Simplivity, which is now part of HPE. All of them lacked a lot of features compared to Nutanix.

For example, automatic sync is not there. To guarantee the performance in all of them, you have to go with all-flash nodes. Nutanix is more cost-effective because we can mix a hyper solution and still get better performance than all-flash from those vendors.

Do a demo. Don't just depend on the theoretical information in the information sheets, but go for an actual demo. Once you see a demo in action, you know exactly what the features are and how to do it.

I rate Nutanix Acropolis a 10 out of 10 because we're getting superior performance, support is very good, and it's a very cost-effective solution.

It is now our single most powerful server that is easily scalable and has an HTML5 site that manages all aspects of the system.

Hyper-convergence is the most valuable feature for me as it allows me to scale the hardware according to project requirements.

It would be great if it could emulate some of the features that their competitor VMware has, for example port mirroring or Netflow output at hypervisor level.

We did not encounter any issues with stability.

We did not encounter any issues with scalability except for cost and feature requests.

Local support has been wonderful so far in my case, but I didn't have many support requirements for my projects.

I was using a standard server infrastructure previously and found an offer for Nutanix so we switched.

The setup was handled by our local IT vendor hence you can say it's convenient.
However I was there to observe how it was done and I can say that you need network experience to link the hardware together as the nodes inside the hardware communicate using TCP/IP.

The software is set up on the get-go (off-the-shelf) but due to my project requirements I have to customize the software, hence the complexity.

If you're willing to spend on hyper-convergence technologies be prepared to pay more and be locked down to a specific hardware vendor.

The basic license that comes with the box allows basic virtualization features but advanced automation features would require an upgrade of licenses.

Before the purchase we were evaluating VMware only.

Please be prepared to be locked down on the hardware.

Our 125 seat VDI implementation went from barely usable, to a good alternative, to desktops. The performance of our server apps has never been better.

One-click upgrade and data locality are valuable features. The one-click upgrade provides simple management and upgrades. Data locality provides super-fast data access and ultra-low latency.

The focus on performance improvements over new features is more important to me. It is always fun to play with new buttons in the platform.

In reality, it is hard for me to find flaws in this platform because it is without comparing. For me, the fact that I run all of my workloads on Nutanix, which is a software defined datacenter platform, the biggest advantage for me is performance increases with updates. I was once asked what does "Software Defined" mean to me. My response was "a platform that allows for your next feature or performance upgrade to be as easy as a software patch or update."

To receive a performance enhancement by merely clicking the one button upgrade is the true value of the platform and what I look forward to the most. I do understand that new features provide the wow in the platform and I completely understand this value. However, for a datacenter admin, performance increases without cost, and sometimes unexpectedly delivered, is real wow.

There have been no stability issues so far.

There were no issues with scalability. It's built for scale.

Nutanix support is second to none. There has never been an issue when interacting with them.

We previously used Vblock, a converged solution. We switched for many reasons. Footprint, power, cooling, savings, and support time.

I did the setup myself in less than 45 minutes from box to data.

You get what you pay for here.

We evaluated VMware VXRail/Rack and SimpliVity. We did PoCs. The hands-down winner was Nutanix!

Do a PoC and judge for yourself. It costs nothing but time.