Nutanix Unified Storage (NUS) Reviews

We use the solution more for Citrix profile VDI. We also have some Windows servers running, and we use Nutanix Unified Storage more for the server platform. If I remember correctly, we have more than 1,200 servers running on the Nutanix cluster.

Our company is a product-based company that performs order processing. Most of our applications are on the web. We also get invoices and a lot of files. It generates a lot of files and keeps them on the server, and the application is posted on some of Nutanix's servers as well.

In my experience, we haven't had any outages so far. The virtualization of the memory is based on the usage, and it consumes a lot. The previous tools were not as efficient as compared to Nutanix Unified Storage.

Nutanix Unified Storage is a cluster. Compared to any other virtualization environment, Nutanix Unified Storage doesn't require any downtime to upgrade and doesn't experience storage outages. So, things are going smoothly with Nutanix, and that's the best part of the Nutanix cluster for storage.

The solution's most valuable feature is the Prism Central centralized management console. We have close to eight to nine clusters and also remote sites. Compared to other tools, the solution is easy to manage. I would also like to mention the solution's ActiveDR concept and replication.

We have sites from different locations, and we are in the process of procuring ultimate licensing. Even if one cluster goes down, we can bring it up and have the application operating from the other site. That's the beauty of the tool, which makes it more efficient.

We use Cohesity from Nutanix to protect our organization's unstructured data. We also have a cloud-based Rubrik tool. Cohesity has the same infrastructure as Nutanix Unified Storage. I am an administrator for both Nutanix Unified Storage and Cohesity. We take snapshot-level backups. Since we are implementing ultimate licensing for remote sites, we will use an internal snapshot feature to replicate to the other sites.

The solution's storage and scalability features have improved our data operations. Our storage is increasing daily for business purposes. Nutanix Unified Storage has good scalability. We recently received some orders, and some nodes were added.

I like Nutanix's data locality feature because it improved our data accessibility and availability.

Implementing Nutanix Unified Storage has tremendously reduced the number of storage nodes by around 20% to 30%.

There is no tagging concept in Nutanix Unified Storage where you can tag the servers. It is more useful for backups because I manage backups as well. In other solutions, you can group servers in the backup. Although we can do a complete cluster of VMs in Nutanix, we cannot tag the server to a particular tag ID or number you can pull from the backup solutions.

If you call for that number, the server should ideally take the backups irrespective of the cluster in which it is present. We faced issues with those things. We have to protect the entire cluster manually. The server tagging feature could be added to the solution's future releases.

We didn't face any issues in Nutanix after the upgrade, but we had issues with the Cohesity backups. We consistently work with both the vendors, and that has been fixed. So that is the only thing that we had faced up to the upgrade.

We have been using the solution in my current organization for four years, and I used it for over a year in my previous organization. So, I have a total of five years of experience with Nutanix Unified Storage.

Nutanix Unified Storage is a stable solution. That's what we need. I see. As a customer, we look for such solutions to stabilize our environment and storage. Our day-to-day business requires that.

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

Around 784 users use the solution in our organization.

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

The solution's technical support is good and pretty responsive. We contact the support for small issues, and their problem-solving is the highest.

I rate the solution’s technical support a nine or ten out of ten.

Positive

The solution's initial setup is straightforward. The upgrade from a previous version to the latest version is also easy. I wasn't involved in the solution's initial setup because it already existed when I joined the company. However, I was involved in increasing the nodes, which took around three to four hours. I don't remember exactly because it's been a while since we added storage.

From what I hear from the management, Nutanix Unified Storage has comparatively decent pricing. I think we are in pro licensing and have yet to get ultimate licensing.

We are not into AI yet. I'm an administrator and not an authorized personnel for those things. We are a product-based electronic components reseller. From what I have heard from management, we will be implementing AI soon.

We are mostly concerned about and focused on security hardening. Some internal solutions, like SentinelOne, have been recommended for security hardening. However, we are not dedicatedly using anything. We are also checking Cohesity DataHawk, and we are still in the process of finalizing it.

The solution is deployed in eight locations. We have multiple nodes in our main data center and DR data center. We mainly use the solution for VDI profiles and server virtualization.

I told my old colleagues that we are using Nutanix Unified Storage, and they were pretty impressed with its features. I would recommend Nutanix Unified Storage to users as a unified storage solution.

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

We mainly got onto Nutanix Files to replace our existing corporate file system. We had plans to migrate almost 100 terabytes of storage, but due to some optimization, we migrated 60 terabytes and ditched the rest because it was useless data. Luckily, we figured out that we do not need that data anymore. That is our main case, and we have set up five separate instances of Nutanix Files so far.

Management-wise, it has made work a lot easier. It is all in one place physically. It is much better now.

There is ease of management. We only have one place to go, and we can find all the information and all the data that we need. It also improved the visibility of the actual usage of our resources. We can see how many people are accessing files at all times. That was one of the main drivers through which we were able to see that our users were not using some of the data at all. We were able to archive that data. If we had Nutanix Analytics and Files Analytics in place, we would have gone a step further and automated the archival of cold data. At this time, we do not have that much to manage, but in the future, we will implement that.

It is hard to assess Nutanix Unified Storage for detecting and blocking ransomware threats because I never had a chance to see it in action. It is enabled everywhere. Maybe we were just lucky. We have not had any ransomware incidents since implementing Nutanix Files, but seeing how the policy is set up, I expect it to react very fast. Hopefully, I will never have to verify the accuracy of this claim.

To protect unstructured data in our organization, we use HYCU backups. They are great partners of Nutanix. HYCU has been awesome and flawless so far. These tools are not critically vital, but they do add to the mix. There is plenty of useful information I can get from those tools. I am glad they are there.

It is very easy to manage. I am focusing mostly on Nutanix Files because of our use case. I did not have a chance to look at Objects, for instance. We will start looking at Volumes at some point this year. With regards to Files, it is very intuitive. It is easy to manage, and it makes it much easier for us to manage the corporate system. Everything is consolidated in one place rather than having to jump all over Europe, which is how spread it was before. That is a big win for us.

It is hard to say what can be better because we have been using Nutanix products for 11 years. We have been with Nutanix for a long time, and it is difficult to find flaws. The moment we find something that is not up to our expectations, we raise a request for a new feature or engage with support. We usually get an answer fairly quickly. There is not much we are missing. When it comes to Nutanix Files, one thing that would be great is a slightly easier way of managing snapshots and restore points, especially when a third party is involved. We have a third party for backups. They look after the data that we are managing. At times, it is difficult to discern which recovery point has been generated. In a new iteration, they can perhaps amend that piece of management. It is a tiny detail. It already works, but if they can implement a more straightforward way of managing those recovery points, it will be a good thing.

I have been using Nutanix Unified Storage for about two years now.

It is very stable. I have not had any issues. Even when we roll updates, nobody notices what is happening in the background, so it is very reliable.

We have not had the need or the requirements to scale. It seems that it would be fairly straightforward. It will be as easy. It will be a one-click to deploy a new node or add a new node to an instance or anything like that.

We have a good relationship with our Nutanix account manager. Whenever we have a technical question, we drop it to them. If we are unsure of what to do, we reach out to tech support. They usually get back to us super fast.

Their customer support is very good. They are very knowledgeable. I do not think there has ever been an issue that they could not resolve. If that happens, it is because it may be a new bug. If we find something that nobody else found before, they reach out and tell us that it is something that is going to be fixed in the next three days. They give us a workaround. If they are not able to fix it immediately, they let us know that it is in their roadmap. They would do it in one of the next releases or add it to the list of features that they plan to add because nobody has asked before. In that sense, it is awesome.

I would rate them a ten out of ten.

Positive

We did not have anything similar. It was a custom-built or internally-built solution based on the existing features of Nutanix. We just managed it manually.

In terms of implementation, it was as easy as you could imagine. Even migrating the data was very straightforward. It took us plenty of time because of the amount of data that we had to move. Other than that, it was fine.

It was supposed to replace a different solution. It was just a matter of deploying the instance that I was looking for and then slowly migrating the data over. I did not encounter any major issues there.

I am saving a lot of man-hours in managing or figuring out issues or finding solutions for the problems that arise. In the past, I would have had to check everything in the chain to figure out what was wrong. It is a lot easier, especially with regard to permissions on a file system. The solution we had in place before was a pain in the neck.

It is above my role. I am not the one who makes the calls, but it seems to me that it was very competitive. Other solutions would have required dedicated hardware, so an additional CapEx has to be put in place. In that sense, it was definitely a more competitive option to go with Nutanix Files. We did not get storage for every node just for the sake of adding files, but it was a wider solution for that.

We had other options. We do have different storage devices in place. We decided to centralize on Nutanix because we have been working with them for quite a long time, and we have been very happy with their products. It seemed like a fairly straightforward decision, but then, of course, we tested it. It proved to be a much more efficient way of dealing with what we had in place.

We do not have any data-intensive workloads. Our use case is mainly for the corporate file system. When I start using volumes, I expect the same performance as standard VMs. I will be happy to see a very high performance like everything else so far.

Implementing Nutanix Unified Storage has not resulted in a reduction in the number of storage nodes due to increased storage capacity per node. We implemented Nutanix after purchasing storage-heavy nodes.

We are not using Nutanix Data Lens. We have Files Analytics. I was looking into Data Lens. Unfortunately, it did not fall within the budget for this year. Perhaps next year, we will be able to give it a go.

I would rate Nutanix Unified Storage a nine out of ten. It is not yet perfect. They are going to implement a more consolidated interface. There are basically three products that fall under the storage piece. They are not in the same pane of glass, but it is a very solid product, so I can give it a nine. It meets my needs and resolves all my problems so far. I am sure that when we start implementing volumes, it will prove to be a good solution for that. It is in our roadmap to start using volumes to solve a couple of issues that we have at the moment. I am already confident that it will do so.

I use the solution in my company since I have two or three users, specifically cloud customers, who use Nutanix Files and subnets for backup storage and for a common shared folder.

The product's benefits stem from the ease of use and management it offers to its users.

The most valuable feature of the solution stems from the fact that I like the object sizes. The tool's infrastructure is quite easy to implement. I know that I would like the product's licensing model to be much cheaper, especially if I tried to make another type of cluster. When you have huge data, the tool is cheaper.

Nutanix Unified Storage for detecting and blocking ransomware threats is a good option offered by the tool to users for objects and storage. Users can access the right technologies offered by the product so that it is more secure for our company.

Nutanix Unified Storage offers large space per node. The tool does not help reduce the number of nodes used in my company. Usually, my company needs to expand the number of nodes used.

In terms of the tools my company is currently utilizing to protect unstructured data, I would say that there is one option that you can use for your data protection. You can have two or three implementations to develop a disaster recovery for unstructured data, especially for the ones on file servers.

The product does not offer one console. From an improvement perspective, it should offer one console. With Prism Central, Nutanix tried to manage all the stuff, but I believe that it can be made easier.

I have been using Nutanix Unified Storage for three or four years. My company is in partnership with Nutanix.

My company deals with the product's customers who work in the government sector who use it at a massive level. The product is also used in the banking sector. The product is very stable in general.

The solution's technical support is awesome, quick, and effective. I don't really use the product's support services. Whenever I use the product's support services, it has always been good. I rate the technical support a nine to ten out of ten.

Positive

Before bringing Nutanix Unified Storage into our company, files and objects were stored in separate products. My company used to use one solution named Nutanix Mine. All the licenses gained by our company work in a different manner.

Some of my company's clients used to use QNAP's NAS solutions. My company's client changed to Nutanix Unified Storage since it offers more reporting options, making it more cost-effective in terms of management.

The solution is deployed on an on-premises model.

The licensing model the tool has is cheaper than an HCI storage solution. You can get a straightforward compression feature in Nutanix Unified Storage, which is better than buying a SAN solution of eight terabytes for 1,000 USD. If you have some complexities and some requirements, or if the users operate in a government agency or in a VDI environment, depending on how you like to use it, it is better to use a solution from Nutanix instead of an all-modern block storage tool.

As my company is in partnership with Nutanix, we cannot consider another product against Nutanix Unified Storage.

I have never used anything in the tool associated with AI, so I don't know about Nutanix Unified Storage's throughput or latency for data-intensive workloads, such as AI or data analytics.

I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

Nutanix Unified Storage is our primary storage solution, and I primarily use its volumes to provide additional disk space for machines. These volumes are shared between vision machines and technical servers. However, for some projects, this solution was discontinued. I currently have all of my additional systems running on bare-metal machines, which fully utilize the available hardware and provide ample storage capacity. To accommodate this, I've repurposed the volumes to share them over the network and connect them to the bare-metal hosts and storage systems. This approach has proven to be highly effective for multiple companies I've worked with.

Another use case for Nutanix Unified Storage is sharing storage through the SMB and NFS protocols. This has been particularly beneficial in my work, as it allows both Windows and Linux machines to access shared files seamlessly. This is a valuable feature for large-scale projects.

Nutanix Unified Storage also offers object storage, which I have used in large-scale environments. However, I have not been entirely satisfied with the available options. Therefore, I have opted to use AWS object storage instead. Currently, I do not utilize Nutanix object storage internally due to ongoing limitations. A year ago, I attempted to integrate object storage into my workflows, but it fell short of my requirements. Consequently, I reverted to the AWS system. Overall, I am pleased with the file storage and volume options provided by Nutanix Unified Storage, as they have significantly enhanced my productivity in various tasks and projects.

I previously worked at a hospital where I utilized Nutanix Unified Storage to facilitate data sharing and capture from the laboratory. I developed a shared design using Nutanix Unified Storage over the network infrastructure. This design enabled seamless data transfer whenever a machine-generated a test result. Upon receiving a blood sample, the machine, connected to a printer, would automatically print the blood test results and the blood type. Additionally, a copy of these results was generated and shared via the Nutanix Unified Storage platform. Using the 'fixable to call' function, I mounted the shared file to the machine, enabling the automatic printing of one hard copy and the simultaneous sharing of a soft copy. This allowed lab technicians or lab doctors to conveniently send the test results to the attending physician at the clinic or directly to the patient.

Nutanix Unified Storage has proven to be flexible to meet our needs.

Unified Storage is good at unifying our organization's block files.

Implementing Unified Storage has streamlined the way I manage and execute tasks across our multiple branches. Unified Storage has enabled me to consolidate data, effortlessly mount it to machines, and share files and folders with colleagues in different locations.

Unified Storage's ability to remove silos is good.

The integrations between Unified Storage, Kubernetes Engine, and the database service are complete. We have not encountered any incompatibility issues.

The Nutanix block files are the most valuable feature.

Unified Storage failed to fulfill our object storage requirements.

The virtual volume has limitations. If I create more than one disk, it encounters limitations. When I mount the volume group to the physical machine, it updates the same disk or partition on the machine, which is not desirable. I was working on a media project that required ten gigabytes of data. I created a volume group of that size, but due to the limitations of the virtual disk, which can be up to 64 terabytes, I had to create a mini disk. Once I mount the disk to the physical machine, it creates a mini virtual disk or mini partition, not just a single partition.

I have been using Nutanix Unified Storage for five years.

Nutanix Unified Storage is stable.

The technical support is one of the best support services we have used.

Positive

I previously used VMware in another organization.

The initial deployment is straightforward and I can do it myself.

I would rate Nutanix Unified Storage ten out of ten.

The security of Unified Storage is comparable to that of other SDS solutions, and we have not encountered any security concerns.

Our positive experience with Unified Storage has prompted us to further invest in Nutanix products to establish our private cloud with on-premises data centers.

I would recommend Nutanix Unified Storage for anyone researching enterprise data storage solutions.

We run our VMs on Nutanix Unified Storage. We were trying to reduce the data center footprint and shrink the bandwidths on the number of storage units that we were using. We also wanted to avoid having to deal with different vendors when there is an issue. We have a 700 TB environment.

We use Varonis for ransomware protection. It's very expensive, but it does a very good job. Varonis monitors file pattern changes and maintains well-known dictionary sets.

The life cycle managers of the PCMs are very impressive, and I like them. They make our lives easy when managing patches and security updates when they come in. A life cycle manager helps to consolidate different vendors.

Also, because the management is simplified, I can depend on one or two people. We are able to reduce contractors and FTEs. We used to be a team of more than ten people, and now we are a team of six. As such, we are able to save about $400,000 a year.

We have to run mandatory disaster recovery processes every year. It's very important that Nutanix Unified Storage is able to manage and run our storage from any location.

Nutanix Unified Storage removed siloes from our organization’s storage.

Security is an area for improvement. When there are vulnerabilities, there needs to be a faster approval process. The solution needs to automatically target the vulnerabilities and not waste too much time.

We have been Nutanix customers for two years.

NUS's stability is very good.

Nutanix's technical support is good. They go the extra mile to help us out with health checks as well. Therefore, I would give them a nine out of ten.

Positive

NUS's initial setup was straightforward.

Our partner, CAS Severn, helped us with the initial deployment process.

I believe that we have seen an ROI.

I would recommend trying Nutanix Unified Storage. I rate it a nine out of ten.

We use Nutanix Unified Storage for object and file storage.

We wanted to improve the availability of our storage solution by implementing Nutanix Unified Storage.

Nutanix Unified Storage is a flexible solution that is efficient.

Nutanix Unified Storage has enabled our organization to consolidate our storage needs, eliminating the need for multiple storage solutions.

Nutanix Unified Storage helps us with file and object storage on the same platform.

We are able to easily manage Nutanix Unified Storage from any location.

Nutanix Unified Storage effectively eliminates the silos in our storage and provides centralized access to all our locations across the country from a single location.

Nutanix Unified Storage integrates well with other Nutanix solutions.

The most valuable features of Nutanix Unified Storage are the unified dashboard and the ease of administration.

The integration could be improved by addressing the outstanding tasks that need to be completed before implementation can begin.

The documentation on the support site needs to be improved.

I have been using Nutanix Unified Storage for one year.

I would rate the stability of Nutanix Unified Storage ten out of ten.

I would rate the scalability of Nutanix Unified Storage ten out of ten.

The technical support is quick.

Positive

We previously used Azure NetApp Files.

The initial deployment was intricate due to the comprehensive set of requirements that needed to be fulfilled prior to implementation. It took four weeks and five individuals to complete the deployment.

Nutanix Unified Storage was cheaper than other solutions we evaluated.

I would rate Nutanix Unified Storage nine out of ten.

We have 1,000 users in our organization. Nutanix Unified Storage is currently deployed for a small group of people, but it will be deployed across the organization soon.

Nutanix Unified Storage requires some maintenance.

I recommend Nutanix Unified Storage.

We have a local data center here that isn't connected to the Internet because of the nature of our organization. It does not have any external communications. Last year, we had a disaster when we ran out of storage space in the clusters assigned to the storage containers. We had around 10 TB allocated for files across five clusters. One of our clusters was hosting critical files, so we had to rate the machine consumption from that cluster, and it can expire because the application that the customer was working on was transferring pictures with enormous sizes. 

We realized that we also had the file license, so why don't we go ahead and use it? We contacted Nutanix, and the managers and system engineers suggested we have meetings. We discussed it and then started providing these storage services. Soon, we will expand with node storage, and that will be another option. We're currently looking at best practices because I think there is a limit on the file sizes. We cannot go beyond 10 TB.

The Nutanix solution has improved the overall performance of our infrastructure operations. Nutanix unifies our block file and object storage. It's like a separate service we can provide for the critical applications we are running, but I can ensure each application is secure against ransomware or other vulnerabilities. I will recommend my team to go further with the block and object storage.

I like Nutanix Prism Central. The primary benefit is that we can manage everything from the same page. It also gives you the data in graph form on the main page, so you can keep a close eye on what is happening. You can watch for high utilization and see the disks and reports in the central console. It's a resilient and highly stable application 

The modernized infrastructure and data services feature is the most beneficial to me as an administrator. We derive business value in terms of storage because we have the option of using Windows Firewall.

Nutanix Unified Storage allows us to consolidate our data platform within the Nutanix cluster itself without using external storage. You can work with all types of unstructured data seamlessly with Unified Storage. There should be no problem with that. There are no issues with audio, video, uploads, downloads, etc. 

It's a flexible solution. This is what I understood as I was reviewing the documentation today. Nutanix is trying to simplify storage and has many options for scalability. 

The GUI is easy to use, but it's complex to do tasks from the command line. That is one way they could simplify things for the engineers. People tend to use a graphical interface more than the command line interface. If anything goes wrong, we need to do troubleshooting from the CLI. It would be nice if there were more ways to fix issues within the GUI. 

Nutanix is highly stable. 

Scaling can be a challenge. Once you order a block with a specific size, it will need to be changed to a different node to scale up. We have to expand the cluster and have the nodes ready to increase the storage size. We cannot go ahead and add an extra hard disk if the slots are full.

I rate Nutanix support nine out of 10. 

Positive

We previously used VMware. Nutanix is faster, but the two solutions offer the same level of security.

A typical deployment could probably be completed in a day or two, but our data site required a lot of approvals and an on-site review by our engineer, so our deployment time was around a week. One person is enough to deploy the solution. It doesn't require much maintenance if the clusters are upgraded correctly. 

Switching to Nutanix Unified Storage reduced the total cost of ownership by nearly 50 percent. You can go on the Nutanix website and see a cost comparison of how much you can save over three to five years. 

Nutanix is priced a bit higher than some of its competitors. A lot of Chinese companies like Huawei are entering the Saudi Arabian market trying to provide similar solutions for a lower price. It offers good value, especially the support. Nutanix has a highly competent team. The after-sales support is excellent. 

I rate Nutanix Unified Storage nine out of 10. 

We are a managed services provider, and we customize solutions for every use case. For example, we have a client who built up file servers on Azure and found it very cost prohibitive. Thus, they wanted to move back into Nutanix Unified Storage to reduce costs. Our clients have seen a 7% to 10% reduction in storage costs. We have been able to achieve a 4:1 compression using Nutanix Unified Storage.

We have one client who is currently doing a POC with Nutanix Data Lens.

We have been able to improve efficiency metrics such as performance, dedup, and energy savings by using Nutanix Unified Storage.

One of our clients has 14 different locations, and having a single pane of glass with Nutanix Unified Storage would be a great help for them. We would not have to create 14 different consoles.

Nutanix needs to improve their cybersecurity options at the storage level.

We've been working with this solution for a year.

We have not seen any issues with the stability of the solution.

The initial setup is pretty straightforward. With a few clicks, you can stand your storage up. It reduces the overall life cycle of deployment within the ecosystem.

We have seen an ROI. When we build a solution for a five or six-year contract, we factor in the total cost of ownership. The total cost of ownership for Nutanix is very competitive.

Compared to other solutions, Nutanix Unified Storage is cost-effective and efficient. It also has good performance.

I would recommend Nutanix Unified Storage and rate it a ten out of ten. You will be able to bring in scalability and flexibility.