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Dell XC Appliance vs Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) comparison

Dell Technologies and Nutanix are both solutions in the HCI category. Dell Technologies is ranked #19 with an average rating of 9.0, while Nutanix is ranked #3 with an average rating of 8.5. Dell Technologies holds a 0.3% mindshare in HCI, compared to Nutanix’s 8.4% mindshare. Additionally, 100% of Dell Technologies users are willing to recommend the solution, compared to 94% of Nutanix users who would recommend it.
Dell XC Appliance
Read 8 Dell XC Appliance reviews
  • 195 Views
  • 105 Comparison Views
100% willing to recommend
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructur...
Read 197 Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) reviews
  • 12,656 Views
  • 5,694 Comparison Views
94% willing to recommend
 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

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Executive SummaryUpdated on Oct 31, 2024

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure and Dell XC Appliance compete in the hyper-converged infrastructure category. Nutanix seems to have the upper hand due to its comprehensive feature set, ease of management, and competitive pricing, which results in a quicker ROI.

Features: Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure offers features such as data deduplication, compression, and one-click upgrades that simplify scalability and management. It provides extensive hypervisor capabilities and automation that improve operational efficiency and cost savings. The Dell XC Appliance features a distributed storage fabric that integrates well with VMware environments, offering robust storage and high performance. Its ease of installation and good performance are notable, but Nutanix’s feature set is more comprehensive for complex virtual environments.

Room for Improvement: Nutanix could improve support for multi-tenant environments, expand third-party integrations, and simplify configurations that currently require command-line interface use. Dell XC Appliance could enhance storage provisioning capabilities and multi-cloud interoperability. While Dell finds lifecycle upgrades complex, Nutanix receives feedback for more consistent updates based on user suggestions.

Ease of Deployment and Customer Service: Nutanix offers diverse deployment options, praised for its easy setup and responsive support team. The technical support is fast and efficient. Dell XC Appliance, mostly deployed on-premises, has dedicated support, yet features longer resolution times due to dependence on separate technical support systems. Nutanix is seen as having a more integrated and proactive support service compared to Dell's less streamlined support.

Pricing and ROI: Nutanix provides competitive pricing with benefits in cost savings due to reduced infrastructure needs and enhanced efficiency, despite being more expensive than some competitors. Its flexible licensing model simplifies management and cuts down additional licensing costs. Dell XC Appliance’s pricing varies by configuration and is often viewed as expensive for small to medium-sized businesses. Nutanix users report quicker ROI through reduced operational costs, while Dell XC users recognize ROI but cite higher initial costs.

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Buyer's Guide
Dell XC Appliance vs. Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)
March 2025
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Review summaries and opinions

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

Categories and Ranking

Dell XC Appliance
Ranking in HCI
19th
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
8.5
Number of Reviews
8
Ranking in other categories
No ranking in other categories
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructur...
Ranking in HCI
3rd
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.4
Number of Reviews
197
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined Storage (SDS) (3rd), Software Defined Data Center (SDDC) (1st), Hybrid Cloud Computing Platforms (5th)
 

Mindshare comparison

As of April 2025, in the HCI category, the mindshare of Dell XC Appliance is 0.3%, up from 0.0% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) is 8.4%, down from 8.6% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.
HCI
 

Featured Reviews

reviewer2644977 - PeerSpot reviewer
Enables seamless integration with multiple software and outstanding AI tools
The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor. If multi-hypervisor support is required and VMware does not provide it, then Dell's appliance won't support it. I find it overly reliant on VMware. In cases of company mergers involving different platforms, software that can handle a multi-hypervisor environment would facilitate quicker integration.
Read full review
MahendraPanchotiya - PeerSpot reviewer
Offers a unified platform, reduces downtime, and simple updates
Nutanix offers a unified platform for managing databases, virtual machines, and applications. This simplifies management by consolidating everything into a single interface. While Nutanix may have a higher upfront cost compared to other hypervisors, it can significantly reduce the resources needed for infrastructure management. With our previous hypervisor, we needed nearly ten IT personnel. Nutanix has allowed us to streamline our team to just three members. We use a combination of database technologies, including SQL databases and web servers such as IIS, BHP, and NGINX. Nutanix features helped our organization reduce downtime. I don't recall the last time we had downtime related to Nutanix because it is such a stable product. Nutanix, a reliable product, helps us streamline our processes, which in turn improves company revenue. We began to see the benefits after two years, with a 40 percent reduction in operational costs. We migrated 200 servers from AWS to Nutanix. Nutanix may not consolidate applications, but it helps us run them more efficiently on its platform. Updating is simple with one click. I would rate the updating processes 10 out of 10. Adding compute and storage on demand is not difficult. However, we need to factor in the existing and new firmware and software requirements.
Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"The most valuable features are the deduplication and the compression features."
"The most valuable feature is the low management overhead, and the lower skill set required to manage it."
"When we compare it to normal hardware servers, I'd say it is quite easy to configure and deploy."
"The solution's hardware is great."
"It's an extremely stable solution, and I highly recommend it."
"What I like the most is that it is easy to implement, easy deployment and that it's easy to manage."
"The solution's best feature is its simplicity. It's so simple to deploy it. You've got the VMware, and it's own appliance. It is really helpful. The system is online within half a day and saves so much time."
"From a single screen, I can view VM details, performance, and hardware issues, such as power supply or fan malfunctions, along with RAM module problems."
More Dell XC Appliance pros
"Nutanix Acropolis AOS makes it easy to use and manage projects and it has a good reputation."
"The initial setup was quite straightforward."
"The speed of the operations and of creation of VM is fantastic."
"In the world of IT operations, there is a lot of noise. Traditionally, systems would generate a great deal of alerts, events, and notifications, often leading to the operator either a) not seeing critical alerts since they are lost in the noise or b) disregarding the alerts/events."
"Being able to upgrade our entire cluster with the click of a button during business hours with zero downtime has made managing our infrastructure so easy."
"You need to send commands through the command-line interface(CLI). This could be improved. The commands are done better in VMware."
"This is a complete, very user-friendly product."
"Single click actions is definitely the most important. They were not even aware that they wanted this."
More Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) pros
 

Cons

"We are not always advised of new features or updates, so we must research to stay up to date."
"Dell needs to do a lot of work to simplify the maintenance and life-cycle upgrades for the product."
"The solution's storage size could be improved."
"In the next release, I would like to see support for Docker and containers."
"The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor. If multi-hypervisor support is required and VMware does not provide it, then Dell's appliance won't support it."
"The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor."
"There should be more provisioning capabilities within the solution."
"The cost of using the public cloud deployment is astronomical."
More Dell XC Appliance cons
"The latency needs improvement"
"In terms of what I would like to see improved, I would say the life cycle management. I don't know if it is because they changed to an LCM from the previous way of upgrading the hardware or software but sometimes it feels that it needs a wizard that says, "Check this, check this," telling you your options. The only thing that's a bit frustrating for me is the life cycle management interface. That's the only thing on the entire system that frustrates me."
"The pricing of the solution is too high. It needs to be adjusted or lowered to be more competitive."
"Deployment could be more user-friendly - currently, it requires certain skills with the network and nodes."
"We ran into an issue as a managed service provider because Acropolis isn't designed to be used the way we are running it. For example, if we want to deploy a Kubernetes service, the customer networks need to reach our protected cluster network. We have isolated our customers in separate VLANs. However, our customers' networks must access our cluster network to get features like iSCSI or Kubernetes to run. It's challenging."
"If they can simplify the software slightly for the installation, that would make all the difference."
"The scalability of the solution had some issues because there were many VMs and the replication ran into some bottlenecks. It was an issue that was known to Nutanix and it was not disclosed to the customer."
"I'd like it to be more API-based."
More Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) cons
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"The pricing for Dell EMC solutions is quite expensive and not really made for small or medium-sized businesses."
"The pricing is good."
"We received a good price from Dell."
"The pricing is dependent on the technology and is in direct relation to the manufacturer and the components."
"The price point is very fair for a product in this category but can vary depending on the components selected within the family of products."
"I would rate the price seven out of ten with ten being the most expensive."
"We have a three-year license for the use of this solution."
"Cost-wise, it is very good. It is like the hypervisor cost is not there. We only need to pay for the system and AOS licenses."
"The basic license that comes with the box allows basic virtualization features but advanced automation features would require an upgrade of licenses."
"The pricing is very competitive when compared with other vendors. As long as Nutanix goes forward with the same price and same type of offering, it will definitely have a large number of customers adopting the same solution very soon."
"Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure is expensive."
"We just have a support license for Nutanix."
"The pricing is quite good in comparison with HPE SimpliVity, Nutanix Scale, and even traditional architecture."
More Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) pricing and cost advice
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Comparison Review

it_user244362 - PeerSpot reviewer
Aug 30, 2015
Nutanix vs. VMware EVO:RAIL vs. FlexPod
Originally posted at www.storagegaga.com/dont-get-too-drunk-on-hyper-converged/ I hate the fact that I am bursting the big bubble brewing about Hyper Convergence (HC). I urge all to look past the hot air and hype frenzy that are going on, because in the end, the HC platforms have to be aligned…
Read full review
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
No data available
Educational Organization
36%
Computer Software Company
12%
Financial Services Firm
7%
Manufacturing Company
6%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
 

Questions from the Community

What advice do you have for others considering Dell XC Appliance?
My advice for people who are selling this product is to first make sure that you educate the customers. The customer doesn't often know much about HCI and what the need to be using it for. If they ...
See all answers
What needs improvement with Dell XC Appliance?
The main issue with the DirectVXL appliance is that it only supports a single orchestrator or hypervisor. If multi-hypervisor support is required and VMware does not provide it, then Dell's applian...
See all answers
What is your primary use case for Dell XC Appliance?
Dell offers several benefits with its appliances. Primarily, I can combine them horizontally and vertically, reaching up to sixty-four nodes. Additionally, Dell employs its own artificial intellige...
See all answers
What is the biggest difference between Nutanix Acropolis and VMware vSphere?
We found the reduced power consumption with Nutanix Acropolis AOS a very attractive feature. We also like the interface that allows you to talk directly to your VM from the present software. We fou...
See all answers
How do I choose between Cisco Hyperflex HX Series and Nutanix Acropolis AOS?
Cisco HyperFlex HS series vs Nutanix Acropolis AOS Cisco HyperFlex gives extended hyper-convergence functions from core to edge and multi-cloud environments. It helps IT and OT teams deploy hyper...
See all answers
Which would you choose - Nutanix Acropolis AOS or VMware vSAN?
We found the reduced power consumption with Nutanix Acropolis AOS a very attractive feature. We also like the interface that allows you to talk directly to your VM from the present software. We fou...
See all answers
 

Comparisons

VxRail vs Dell XC Appliance Logo
VxRail vs Dell XC Appliance
Compared 36% of the time
Dell vSAN Ready Nodes vs Dell XC Appliance Logo
Dell vSAN Ready Nodes vs Dell XC Appliance
Compared 24% of the time
More Dell XC Appliance Competitors
VxRail vs Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) Logo
VxRail vs Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)
Compared 8% of the time
VMware vSphere vs Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) Logo
VMware vSphere vs Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)
Compared 6% of the time
Dell PowerFlex vs Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) Logo
Dell PowerFlex vs Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)
Compared 6% of the time
HPE SimpliVity vs Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) Logo
HPE SimpliVity vs Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)
Compared 6% of the time
Hyper-V vs Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) Logo
Hyper-V vs Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)
Compared 5% of the time
More Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) Competitors
 

Product Reports

Buyer's Guide
HCI
March 2025
Dell XC Appliance reportDownload Dell XC Appliance product report
Buyer's Guide
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)
March 2025
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) reportDownload Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) product report
 

Also Known As

No data available
Nutanix Acropolis AOS, Nutanix AOS, Nutanix Acropolis
 

Overview

XC Series hyper-converged appliances integrate Dell EMC 14th generation PowerEdge servers with Nutanix software to offer one of the industry’s most versatile and scalable hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI) platforms. By supporting a choice of hypervisors, XC Series appliances can be deployed quickly for all virtualized workloads to reduce management complexity and total cost of ownership.

Dell Technologies

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) is a top-ranking HCI software, cloud management tool, and Software Defined Storage (SDS) tool that is marketed as the foundation for users' hybrid clouds. It offers a powerful and secure hyperconverged infrastructure to deliver all data and applications at any scale and on any cloud. The solution offers a complete software stack that allows users to unify their hybrid cloud infrastructure. 

NCI’s services include computer, storage and network, hypervisors and containers, and deployment in public or in private clouds. The product also comes with built-in resilience, disaster recovery capabilities, self-healing, and high-security capacities. It provides further deployment flexibility through several software and hardware options and platforms. NCI includes a full set of enterprise capabilities. It can also be deployed on a wide range of servers from popular manufacturers.

The capabilities of the product are categorized into three main groups:

  • AOS storage
  • Flexible and open compute
  • Automated and secure networking

Outside of these categories, NCI also offers other capabilities:

  • Integrated disaster recovery
  • Full-stack lifecycle management
  • VMware with Nutanix
  • Intelligent operations

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) Features

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) offers its customers various features and tools in each of the previously mentioned categories. The available features for users currently include:

  • High-performance: This set of features utilizes hardware advances such as NVMe and RDMA to accelerate users' most demanding applications with consistent performance. The tools in this feature category work alongside data locality to ensure successful results.

  • Foolproof resiliency: These Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure features protect data and keep it available by facilitating advanced distributed consistency algorithms. Users can utilize these features to protect their data from issues like bit rot, hardware failures, and even entire site failure.

  • Flexibility: This set of features allows storage to be sized for the needs of each organization and expanded promptly and easily so that the organization and its data can grow. The features offer flexibility to users in terms of applying storage policies logically on a pre-workload basis, instead of being tied to hardware.

  • Hypervisor choice: Users can choose from the leading hypervisors - Microsoft Hyper-V or VMware ESXi. They can also leverage the built-in hypervisor AHV that Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) provides.

  • Integrated virtualization: These features offer simplified automation and AHV streamlined operations. The services in this category are optimized for high performance and reliability.

  • Kubernetes: Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) offers features to build and deploy cloud-native applications on intelligent distributed infrastructure. Apps can be integrated with cloud-compatible storage and both building and deployment can be achieved within the same platform.

  • Microsegmentation: Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) offers features to prevent malware spread and reduce attack surfaces by leveraging machine learning (ML).

  • Virtual networking: This set of features allows users to easily implement multi-tenancy in their environment or stretch networks across clouds.

  • Centralized network management: Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) provides organizations with a way to manage networking configurations centrally. Users can utilize it across their human-computer interaction (HCI) environment with simple virtual switch management.

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) Benefits

The product offers various benefits to users who utilize its capacities. Some of these include:

  • NCI reduces technology sprawl and frees up technical resources to allow organizations to focus on other activities, potentially reducing costs for the business.

  • The product allows customers to deploy, scale, and bridge to the public cloud to be able to react in evolving business environments.

  • Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure improves data availability while simultaneously protecting it against several kinds of failures and attacks.

  • The solution offers high-performance, resilient distributed storage for all workloads.

  • Working alongside Nutanix Cloud Platform, NCI offers simple management of data from one console.

  • Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure works by the zero trust philosophy, protecting users' apps and data through specially designed security protocols.

Reviews from Real Users

According to Gerhard J., an IT manager at Q4 Fuel, Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) provides serious reliability and stability across the entire system makes for ROI.

A solutions architect at a computer software company describes NCI as a stable, straightforward to set up, and scalable solution.

Nutanix
 

Sample Customers

Cardlytics, AEW Energie, Aubert, Zhongtong Information Service, Commune de Villepinte, Teikyo University Hospital
St. Lukes Health System, the City of Seattle, Yahoo! Japan, Sligro, Empire Life, Hyundai AUS, and many others.
Buyer's Guide
Dell XC Appliance vs. Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)
March 2025
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