Nutanix Cloud Manager (NCM) Reviews

We use the solution as a private cloud management tool in our company.

We create some VMs using Nutanix Cloud Manager Self-Service. The solution's simplicity to use and its configurable features are some of the solution's valuable parts.

I am very satisfied with the solution. The pricing of the solution is an area of concern that needs improvement.

I have experience and work with products from Nutanix. I have worked on the solution for three years. I am a customer of Nutanix.

The solution is very stable. I mean, we don't have problems using the solution.

I'm very satisfied with the product's scalability since it's very good.

Customer support is very good. For everything we need, we call the support, and they work together with us to solve the issue and find a solution quickly. I rate the technical support a ten out of ten.

Positive

It's simple and not complex to do the first setup. For deployment, around four people who were from a technical background, who knew how to operate the system, were required. For the maintenance of the product, four people are required.

On a scale from one to ten, if one is a low price and ten is a high price, I rate the solution's pricing a six.

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

We use Calm as an automation engine for deployment of the cluster software over our network. We are also using it to deploy standardized workloads on the Nutanix clusters.

We also use it to create a "self-service shop," where we can select to deploy standardized workloads and choose a certain profile for a particular server, and the Calm engine will integrate with other solutions like our IP database and CDB. Everything is fully automated.

In addition to standardized workloads, we also can say, "Give us a generic virtual machine."

It really drives up our speed tremendously for getting workloads to the customer as soon as possible. Previously, it took a few weeks to get a virtual machine in place, including deploying the virtual machine and getting the administrative parts in order for it. That process takes a matter of minutes now, if the prerequisites are in place on the networking layer. Our delivery time is incomparably faster than what it was. We're mainly providing platforms to other application teams, and it greatly helps those teams to have a virtual machine in place. Indirectly, it will ultimately help us develop and deploy applications faster.

Calm has also enabled us to react faster to the changing needs of our business, with the significant decrease in the delivery time of certain machines.

I really like the Nutanix Marketplace a lot. We publish standard workloads there and that, in combination with the Projects, allows for self-service, which is the most powerful feature of Calm.

Also, the ease of use when building new applications and offering them in the marketplace is the most elegant feature of Calm.

It also works very well when it comes to optimizing capacity and performance. It allows you to have a framework where it is very easy to automate in a standardized way and provides you the boundaries for standardizing automation. It really helps to unify the way a team works. Calm's abilities when it comes to team collaboration are great. All the workloads are deployed in a standardized manner, and administered that way as well. This is the first time we have been able to do workloads for the machines in a standardized manner. Currently, we are expanding a lot, with a lot of new virtual machines. So if we don't focus on standardization, it will become really hard to manage with a small team. Standardization and automation are very important for enabling us to keep up with the growing infrastructure.

We also use Nutanix Prism Pro and it provides us with insights into application-related infrastructure to a certain extent. But in reality, we haven't done a lot with it yet. The dashboarding is certainly elegant, but we're not utilizing the clusters a lot yet, so it hasn't been very necessary to work with it. Second-day operations are something that we're working on. The deployment is not done and transitioning to operations is in progress.

There is room for improvement in the remote script execution. The way logs are shown in Calm, it's not always keeping up properly. It's really the interface that needs attention there. I believe it is something being worked on at the moment by Nutanix.

Also, the integrated scripting language, which is a very limited form of Python, should be improved. It should be made into a more modern version of Python, and maybe other languages as well. 

I would also like to see an improved ability to integrate with APIs.

I have been using Nutanix Calm for about a year.

It has great stability. We haven't experienced issues with stability with the product.

In terms of scalability, it just works. It has high availability, and we haven't run into any issues where we have needed to scale up.

We have Nutanix clusters located in at least half of our Vopak locations. This year we rolled out the Nutanix platform to 30 locations and, in the next year, 30 additional locations will follow. Currently, the six users of the solution are involved in infrastructure development on the DevOps team. Those are the people who are building on top of Calm.

In general, Nutanix support is great. They're responsive and skillful. We're really pleased with them.

Positive

We did not have a previous solution. Calm was a brand-new implementation for us.

The initial setup of Calm was straightforward. It was just a matter of enabling the product, and that process is very well worked out by Nutanix. Our deployment was done within an hour. It was very fast.

You will see great value from it if you utilize the self-service part of Calm. The price you pay for it will only give you equal value if you use the self-service part to enable other teams. If you only use it as a deployment mechanism, I think it's rather expensive.

We did not really look at other solutions. We chose the hypervisor platform, and Calm came with it. We also looked at VMware as a hypervisor platform, but we chose Nutanix and therefore we went for Calm as well.

Nutanix excels in making something that is very complex into something that is very simple. It's really easy to work with, and the time it takes to get familiar with the product, for an engineer, is way less than with the competitor's platform.

It's very important to think ahead about what your automation strategy will look like. You should really think about creating reusable components and also have good source control and a CI/CD strategy. If you start building without thinking about these things, you will have to do a lot of rework and re-engineering to be able to scale up.

In terms of Calm unifying container and virtual machine automation and orchestration in a single orchestration platform, we're not doing containers yet, only tenants. But in the future, I expect it will do so because our next step we'll be looking into container workloads. But that's not where we are for now at Vopak. Similarly, we haven't used Calm’s AIOps and automation capabilities.

We use Nutanix Prism Pro for central management. We have three clusters and we manage them with Prism Pro. We use it as a central point of managing Nutanix, it's concentrated on Prism Pro's dashboard. Our strategy is to only have one tool to manage our clusters and Prism. 

You can see the health status of the clusters in one view. There is one view of the health of your systems which helps you to have an overview any time you have a problem. You can dig into the tools that Prism Pro has to give you all the options to take on the problem. You can monitor things and manage the cluster really easily.

It's very easy to understand. The interface is very clear.

We plan to use the solution's X-play or Cross-play automation features. This is in contract. We moved to Nutanix and we have a lot to do. For now, we are more concentrated on blueprints but we plan to have a look at these features. 

We have a lot of projects so we cannot always dive deep into the material that Nutanix offers. We would like to but we have other priorities. It was a busy year. We have an external company that does things for us so we can make the process go faster. We know what we need and what we would like to achieve. I'm still on the learning curve. I think Prism Pro is very good and straightforward.

I have been using Nutanix Prism Pro for a year and a half. 

The stability is very good. I cannot say that we have had an issue with the Prism Central dashboard.

Scalability is very technical now. I think you can install a second instance. 

We are three people that work with Prism Central and they're all in service core IT. It's the people from the infrastructure.

We have an external partner that does the maintenance. We will be getting it handed over to us, but until now this external company does all of the maintenance and upgrades. They announce that there is a new upgrade, we plan when we can do it, and then we participate.

We are still in the learning curve and we need really a company that has a lot of experience because it's mission-critical. We have systems that are very mission-critical. We really should be sure that we have people that really know what to do. When we are over the learning curve, then maybe we can take it over. For now, we give all of this stuff to an external company.

We don't use Nutanix as a self-service platform. In our IT, we manage Central so it's not that we use it like many other companies. Like a company that can say "Okay. This department can create the resources that I need" themselves. Now, it all comes into the Central place and we do that. It's still in this little team. Only these core IT people have contact with the Nutanix dashboards.

We have blueprints in the Marketplace but it's not a goal that we made for other people. When a service asks for resources, they communicate to us what they need and we create it with this. When they have a project and they need some new software, they tell us, "Okay. We need this database, those application servers," and then we set up it for them.

We had some issues so we contacted their support. They're great. When you compare to other companies, their support is really great.

This is the first hyperconverged system that we have had. Before, we had XenServer. It is a virtualization framework like VMware. We also used templates. The goal of Nutanix is to have a central place to manage all the network storage. We are still using Virtualization Framework, which is good. We are still doing the migration, but for that, you must have knowledge about SAN management, like SanDisk. This infrastructure has a different discipline and different tools to manage the clusters. Nutanix has one starting point where you can manage all this stuff with one software. So it's a paradigm shift. It's easier. Sometimes SAN can be complex because you need special hardware switches for a SAN connection to the disc system.

With Nutanix, you can grow with your needs. If we need more storage or CPU, we add a node so we get both, we have the storage and the CPU power. The good thing about hyperconverged systems is that you can grow as your needs come.

The initial setup was straightforward. It's a one-click installation. You have to set up the VM  with one click. It's very easy. It's not complex to have this dashboard. It's a one-click installation. The setup took five to ten minutes. 

You click to install Prism Central and then you create a VM and start-up the VM. There is a dashboard that goes over more than one cluster. You don't need to have a background for that. It's a one-click thing.

We planned from the beginning to use Prism Central. When we started with Nutanix, we began with a multicluster system. When you have a multicluster system, you need Prism Central. Then you can manage cluster by cluster. Other than that, you have only Prism Element and that makes no sense. It was clear that we should have Prism Pro.

We see ROI because Nutanix enables us to reduce our hardware footprint. We had a lot more nodes. We don't need SAN anymore. We reduced this need to make a point to save money.

We reduced by 22 nodes. We reduced the hardware so we have cost-saving. With hardware, you need to buy it again every five years and pay for support. We had some nodes for more than five years, and today the new machine has more power. It's hard to compare sometimes.

With Nutanix, we don't really use old hardware. We buy new hardware that's fast because every year the hardware gets faster. If we move the same load to the new hardware, we don't need so much hardware anymore because the machine itself is more powerful. The fact you can reduce and grow as the need comes saves money. 

When we calculate all that we needed before, I think Nutanix is cheap. When you take into account that you need a SAN and all that stuff and you know you can grow as the needs comes in, I think you can save money. With the analytics from Prism where you can see that you have oversized or you can predict how it will grow, you can really react in a timeframe that you also have time to buy the hardware. I think you can save money when you compare to before Nutanix.

My advice would be to go for it. 

It has fulfilled our hopes. We have been doing virtualization for long enough and we see what the pitfalls are. Nutanix gives us a centralized, easier to manage platform. 

We bought a little cluster for the proof of concept and we saw really quickly that this solution is the right way to go. Now, we're focusing on a strategy to replace all the other stuff and to go with Nutanix straight ahead. We plan to use the file cluster but for now, we have a separate file cluster. We prefer to use Era. It's a database central management tool from Nutanix. 

I would rate Nutanix Prism Pro a nine out of ten. 

Some people use a hybrid environment with a combination of on-premises and cloud resources, while others are moving towards a multi-cloud approach. The multi-cloud aspect of Nutanix Cloud Manager Intelligent Operations is becoming increasingly popular. That's also our primary use case. 

The ability to cross between different clouds is a valuable feature of Nutanix Cloud Manager Intelligent Operations. This allows users to take advantage of pricing for storage in the cloud and switch between different cloud providers or vendors without incurring egress fees or movement fees. So, that's the reason why we like to use it. It also provides ease of use to change workloads between cloud providers or vendors.

There is room for improvement in the initial setup. It is quite complex to setup and requires professional services.

I have been using this solution for around a year. 

Nutanix has very good scalability as long as you are not limited to just their features. This is a common issue with virtualized solutions, where the more features you want, the more you have to pay. However, all virtualized solutions can scale well, including Nutanix.

In my opinion, Nutanix's ability to scale well is due to its partnership with different vendors. They now offer regular BYO(Bring Your Own) computing and storage, which is not limited to only Nutanix appliances anymore. Other vendors, such as HPE and even Cisco can now be used, and you are not required to use Nutanix appliances. This has helped Nutanix to scale even better than before.

So overall, the ability to use different vendors and not be locked into a Nutanix appliance has been a big advantage for users.

The customer service and support team is good. 

Positive

Most of the time, customers need to bring in professional services as they don't have the expertise to do it themselves. It's not that intuitive as there's always something missing, which can cost more if a mistake is made.

Nutanix is priced in between VMware, and Hyper V. Hyper V is the cheapest, while Nutanix falls in the middle. However, Nutanix is not cheap, as it has many good features, but you have to pay for them. This is the same with VMware.

Nutanix is cheaper than VMware but not as cheap as Microsoft's Hyper V.

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

El producto es muy estable, también proporciona una interfaz extremadamente intuitiva, pero al mismo tiempo logra un nivel de control sobre todos los recursos. Tuvimos muchos problemas de monitoreo de plataforma ya que trabajamos con un gran volumen en términos de equipos de servicio, esto se debe a que somos una empresa cuya función principal es proporcionar servicios a los usuarios finales a nivel de soporte, requisitos y fallas. Por lo tanto, es de vital importancia mantener un mejor control de nuestro centro de datos. Una vez más, menciono que es un producto 100% recomendado.

Como una mejora, me gustaría ver una variedad de idiomas y un poco más simplificado el proceso inicial de conexión de red, a pesar del poco tiempo que tengo administrando esta plataforma en mi organización, considero que realiza el trabajo especificado en el Para los requisitos de la empresa para la que trabajo, también tengo poca experiencia en el área, por lo que recomiendo esta herramienta como el primer paso para un gran nivel tecnológico de conocimiento, mis colegas y yo estamos felices de haber adquirido Prism Pro.

Tiene una mejor gestión de la plataforma de ahorro de costos y un mejor control y mantenimiento de los recursos. No puedo pensar en ninguna mejora en este momento, pero el soporte es de primera categoría. Hemos tenido muchos problemas para actualizar desde el principio. Al principio, vi el manual de usuario del producto, pero al instalarlo y administrarlo de una manera práctica, pude ver que es muy amigable y confiable a nivel de interfaz, al mismo tiempo muy específico, muestra características de los recursos nunca observado al menos por mí en plataformas similares

Considere que es una plataforma interesante y muy amigable que permite una mayor eficiencia de gestión, permite un mejor escenario de monitoreo. Sin embargo, sabemos que la tecnología avanza día a día, una buena estrategia sería crear una aplicación gratuita, el usuario puede estar aún más interesado en la plataforma, puede controlar el monitoreo a través de teléfonos y enviar manuales o folletos de información por correo para ir a mano junto con la plataforma y sus actualizaciones, además de las actualizaciones realizadas por el monitor en cualquier lugar donde estemos encriptados.

He estado usando Nutanix Prism Pro durante seis meses. 

La estabilidad es increíble.

I have not used previous solutions

The primary use case for Nutanix Cloud Manager is to distribute the workload for the infrastructure. It is used for virtualization and integrates with the front end to provide cloud features as a private cloud to the development and operations team, leading to less management overhead for the administrator team.

Nutanix Cloud Manager is a stable product compared to other vendors. It is beneficial for integrating with the front end to provide cloud features as a private cloud to development and operations teams. This reduces management overhead for the administrator team, allowing the end users to directly access features and reducing integration time.

The file server is the best feature because it supports different vendors such as Microsoft Hyper-V and VMware without locking with a specific vendor. Nutanix is a stable product with fewer limitations compared to competitors like VxRail. It is beneficial for integrating with the front end to provide cloud features as a private cloud to development and operations teams. This reduces management overhead for the administrator team.

The product could be more flexible with plugins. Quick resolution of disconnection issues and errors in plugins is crucial. Sometimes plugins are not working well, and the resolution time is too long.

I have been using Nutanix Cloud Manager for around two years.

It is a stable product. Bugs, glitches, and downtime are minimal. I would rate the stability a nine out of ten.

Scalability is good, and I would rate it a ten.

Technical support is good. I would rate it nine out of ten.

Positive

I used VMware VCF before, but it was not as flexible compared to Nutanix.

The initial setup was moderate. It required some understanding of clustering, so while it was doable, it was not very easy for every user to undertake.

The deployment involved around ten people.

Setting up Nutanix Cloud Manager has saved a significant amount of time. Compared to VMware, the setup time was reduced by about twenty percent.

The pricing is moderate. It is not cheap or expensive.

I used VMware VCF before, but it was not as flexible as Nutanix. I also considered VxRail.

I would give Nutanix Cloud Manager a seven out of ten. The complete solution is overall good, but some improvement is required, especially with the flexibility of plugins and disconnection issues.

We had large testing VM servers environment on Cisco UCS with Nimble storage, and we have a large Dev environment on Azure. We have a hard time monitoring and managing both environments. And we end up paying lots of money for both. After talking to Nutanix, we ordered 8 nodes, setup and we migrated most of our Dev/Test VM servers back from Azure back in-house. We use Prism to manage all of them from single point of view, have overall picture of our whole environment. The dashboard is the best spot we check and keep it on our screen every day.

We had a test VM environment on Cisco UCS and Dev environment on Azure. From time to time, we need to transfer a large amount of data from one to another. And we have to spin up a different set of test/dev environment, which was challenging. We had many struggles with VM updates and configuration synch up. Since migrating to Nutanix, we have a single virtual platform for both test and Dev virtual environment. It's easy to transfer data and synch up the change and manage/monitor from a single point. Backup is much easier too. 

• Update management for all nodes, which included in it and it is straightforward and visual upgrade processes. 
• Calm is another good feature we are looking at to use the playbook to manage all VMs. We are likely to give a trial on that.
• File is a cool feature that allows you to share files like windows server but actually without a server and it can replicate the changes by using a build-in replication tool. I can snapshot the shared data and the user can restore the files by themselves if needed, which saves lots of effort of SD.

I still remember it was a struggle when we configured the initial network setup, that part was a little bit confusing about how exactly it works, we have two different Nutanix technicians who were on-site to help on the configuration. But both of them could not get right the first time, and we had to reset and start over again on both systems. Even after that, I was still a little bit confused about the virtual network and how each item was configured to work. I would think why do not have a single virtual IP and webpage to guide on that, or sort of wizard to guide through it.

I have been using Nutanix Prism Pro for two years. 

It is a very easy and stable solution, we have not had any issues. 

It is very easy to scale out, you can just keep adding node to have more capacity, and mange from the same prism.

Support is good. But we do not use them much.

We used Cisco UCS with Nimble storage which was over the capacity, then we got some VMs on the Azure, which we have to manage separately. So we moved everything to 8 nodes Nutanix and manage from a single point.

The setup is straightforward. Only the initial network setup is a little bit confusing.

We deployed mostly in house, but we have help from Nutanix engineer. They are very good.

The ROI is better than what we have on Azure and UCS.

The set cost is very minimal, the Nutanix pricing is good too. The file licensing should be bound into the system already.

Yes, because the UCS is close to end of life, we tried to move to Azure, but the cost skyrocketed. 

We have installed a physical Nutanix box and we have created the server on it. Our infra is running on that server. We have Citrix infra, so we configured our Citrix in Nutanix only.

We were facing some issues with a vendor accessing our VDI, but after we installed Nutanix, that issue was resolved.

Among the most valuable features are 

• the one-click upgrade
• that Nutanix is very easy to understand
• that it's very user-friendly.

We have been using Nutanix Prism Pro since 2018.

In terms of its stability, it is a good solution.

The scalability is also good. We have around 4,000 users across India and we are planning to increase our node in six or seven months.

Currently, we need no more than four or five staff to operate the Nutanix infra.

We have faced some issues during operations, but when we log a case with Nutanix support, they help us to resolve them. Their technical support is very good. The support they provide is extraordinary. If we raise a P1 ticket, they will respond within 20 to 30 minutes.

Positive

We used VMware but we migrated to Nutanix.

We are not facing any problems with the solution. Nutanix is good when compared to its competitors. My advice is to go for it. We have another office in India, where they have a VMware setup, and we are going to migrate them to Nutanix there as well.