Nutanix AHV Virtualization Reviews

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

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

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

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

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

I have been using Nutanix AHV Virtualization as a partner.

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

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

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

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

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

Nutanix AHV works really well. It's much easier to administer and manage than VMware. Since we're not a large IT department within the finance sector, our team is relatively small. We don't have a huge team of IT professionals to manage all the other systems.

Everyone desires to maintain competitive AHV pricing. AI technology has made significant strides. However, AI also introduces complexities in terms of security. It seems to function but when considering security, it adds layers of management. Integrating AI involves managing IT processes and ensuring they don't compromise security or provide unauthorised access. Unforeseen events may occur due to AI implementation, which require careful consideration. While AI streamlines certain tasks, it doesn't offer a universal solution to improve everything instantly. Incorporating targeted AI solutions within competing products is advantageous. In terms of financial considerations and functionality, integrating AI and Microsoft components into half of the Nutanix AHV evaluation is beneficial. When it comes to the core networking infrastructure, stability and reliability are paramount.

I have been using Nutanix AHV Virtualization for four years.

The product is stable.

The solution’s scalability is very high.

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

Nutanix AHV wasn't difficult to complete compared to VMware. VMware can be quite complex. Shifting from one account to another, or from one platform to another, but making a direct comparison is challenging. Nutanix has adopted a similar approach. However, Veeam operates differently. Their focus is on delivering a fast and comprehensive product, like Spectrum. They aim to provide an all-in-one solution.

Nutanix is made up of many different components. Our approach varies, especially with larger virtualization setups, depending on your requirements. If you're a large organisation with thousands of users and hundreds of offices, then, it will be a better fit depending on the requirements. For a small organisation with just a few offices, Nutanix AHV might be easier and simpler to deploy, administer, noticing that it works for larger deployments. 

The initial setup is super easy and takes a couple of hours to complete. We deploy the Nutanix AHV virtualization product on major data centres. We'll back up and replicate our data there.

Deploying the hardware only takes a couple of hours to plug it in. There are other factors to consider from a production. We can't simply download databases, client applications, or live trading functionalities. These aspects need to be carefully managed through change control procedures. The migration was conducted systematically and methodically over a certain time period. If you condense the actual time it took to perform the migration. You have to consider the number of virtual machines. It could take a couple of hours. Therefore, it's unfair to categorise it solely as an economic trend because it depends on several factors.

If I had to pay for it personally, I wouldn't be able to afford it. Considering how much business we generate and how it aligns with current trends, it's worth it for the company. If you're only going to deliver one package once a month, buying a big truck would be expensive for you. But if you're delivering fifty packages every day and making money from it, the cost of a one-minute delay on the truck isn't very significant. Nutanix offers enterprise-class hardware and software. It's a solution tailored for enterprises and while it might be quite expensive for smaller businesses, it's well worth the investment. In the market segment it operates in, it offers competitive features.

We've two Nutanix clusters that replicate between each other. One is production and another one is disaster recovery. It has higher availability clusters. We've three nodes on the side, and it's replicated between the two. One of the nodes goes down. The network capabilities of AHV is very good.

Everything would be connected. It's all on one singular platform, making management streamlined. There's no need for add-ons; everything you need comes with Nutanix. You won't find yourself constantly adding and using different add-ons, or dealing with the complexities of integrating with Linux.

The best implementation is to integrate the Nutanix AHV virtualization framework directly with the hardware and facility infrastructure. This allows you to quickly start using and building new virtual machines in just a couple of hours. It's a seamless process that significantly reduces deployment time.

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

I use Nutanix AHV Virtualization for the servers in our bank, where we have a lot of applications. In general, my bank uses Nutanix AHV Virtualization to host our application servers.

The most valuable features of the solution stem from the fact that I have never had to face any security issues from the use of the solution. I haven't faced any issues like ransomware when using Nutanix AHV Virtualization.

When cleaning up my environment and server room during one of the projects, my bank wanted us to shut down the servers. To face no complications in our company, we had to switch off virtual machines one after the other before heading to Nutanix platform and going to edge services to switch off and turn off everything, making it a challenging process for me. The aforementioned area can be considered for improvement in the solution.

I have been using Nutanix AHV Virtualization for six years. I am a user of Nutanix.

It is a stable solution. I haven't faced stability issues in the solution.

I haven't faced any problems with the solution's scalability.

I am the only administrator for the solution. My company's other branches located in Tanzania, Zambia, and Kenya are planning to move away from Nutanix AHV Virtualization. Still, I think we should try to standardize the platforms to get better future support.

I don't have any problem with the solution's technical support. I rate the technical support a ten out of ten since I like the platform. You may find that you may go into the platform and call other people to discuss your issues with the platform, making it one area where I think that I should have a little bit of control.

Positive

The initial setup of Nutanix AHV Virtualization was simple because I understood the product, and I could go through a few tutorials since I was given access to the platform where I could see everything related to the product at once. In Nutanix AHV Virtualization, when I was working with edge devices off-site remotely, I saw that it had many layers since there were too many releases and logins, making it look very demanding.

The solution is deployed on an on-premises model.

I have been trying to determine if I need to opt for a single package or two packages to operate Nutanix and virtual machines. I would like to see some documentation from Nutanix providing clarity over the aforementioned statement.

My company chose Nutanix AHV Virtualization over other platforms in the market since it was a recommendation made by the main office of my company. My company mostly operates from South Africa, and from there, we get the direction to go ahead with our work, so today, they can suggest we use one platform, while tomorrow, they may recommend another.

I recommend Nutanix AHV Virtualization to others who plan to use it since I personally prefer the solution, especially in scenarios where I get absolute control over the product. Currently, my control over the product is limited since there are people between me and Nutanix AHV Virtualization.

Considering the solution's scalability, stability, and manageability options, I rate the overall product a ten out of ten.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Positive

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

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

However, we have about five people for maintenance. 

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

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

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

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

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

We are hosting our mission-critical applications on the Nutanix cluster.

Because of our business needs and application requirements, we have some limitations in terms of migrating our services to the cloud. As a hospital, we need ultra-low latency applications that are very critical for patient care. We need our solution within the same building so that latency requirements can be met. We have a huge amount of data and accessing it is more easily feasible within the data center within our building.

The main advantage we have now, using Nutanix AHV Virtualization, is that it has helped us reduce downtime. Earlier, we were on a three-tier infrastructure, with separate server, storage, and network. Opting to go with Nutanix SDI over the last two years has resulted in zero downtime. Even if there is maintenance is going on for upgrades, there is zero downtime. DR runbooks and snapshots have both helped us.

In addition, the security features have helped reduce operational challenges. Out-of-the-box, the security of AHV is already hard-coded and hardened. As a customer, I don't have to worry about the security or about adding another layer of security.

It is super easy to manage and doesn't require any specific technical skills to operate. We can provision new infrastructure on-demand with a few clicks. Because of that, it has reduced our IT administration overhead by up to 85 percent. If we compare provisioning network and storage and servers separately with the way that is done in Nutanix, it takes that much less time to provision new servers and resources. That is a big gift.

It has reduced the burden on our administrators. That 85 percent of time is available for an administrator to do other things, rather than providing and monitoring the resources. This is the big takeaway that we have achieved.

And in terms of consolidation, we have placed all of our high-I/O-latency and critical applications on Nutanix SDI. Initially, they were on legacy hardware from different OEMs, like Dell and HPE. Managing those older solutions required multiple skill sets, in Dell and HPE. Now that we have migrated these critical applications to Nutanix, there is no backend. The technology is working in the backend and, as an administrator, I don't have to do a deep dive into the technology. This consolidation was critical and that's why we moved to Nutanix.

We removed a legacy SAN from our environment. Initially, we had separate servers and then the SAN switches. With the SDI consolidation, we don't need any additional SAN boxes or switches to run the applications or servers. We bought our Nutanix solution with enough storage so that we could eliminate the SAN part, and it has helped us with performance as well, because the storage is directly attached to the Nutanix boxes.

The hypervisor AHV itself is the most valuable because it is almost invisible, from an administrative point of view. There's nothing to maintain or learn about the hypervisor technology Nutanix has used.

The feature that has had the most impact is data locality. That is a feature that makes Nutanix different from other hypervisors. It helps us to get application performance that is probably double what we got with the legacy, three-tier architecture.

It also supports all platforms, like Microsoft, Linux, and other OVF templates. It is kike other hypervisors in that it is equally capable and enterprise-class. And another very helpful aspect, from a cost point of view, is that it's free.

And when it comes to application visibility and performance, we can see it all in a single window. We get a realistic view of our application performance and security.

Nutanix has a Prism Central flavor and a Prism Element flavor. Prism Element is the very basic level. It provides management for Nutanix AHV. If we have to opt for a high level of capacity planning and need more analytics—like deciding on new purchases or budgeting, or if we need additional resources in the near future—we need to pay for Prism Central. I would suggest that Nutanix improve a bit on the analytics part of Prism Element so we can calculate those kinds of things within that flavor.

We bought it in December 2019 and it was in production in the first quarter of 2020, so we have been using Nutanix AHV Virtualization for more than two years.

It is super stable. I have used ESXi and Microsoft Hyper-V in addition to AHV. I have experience on all three platforms and they are equally stable. AHV is an enterprise-class hypervisor.

The solution is very scalable. We can scale horizontally. If we need memory, we can buy a memory-intensive node and add it to the cluster in the same way we would for compute or storage.

We have around 1,500 users in our organization. All of them use the applications that are hosted on Nutanix.

The technical support is very good. We have a variety of services from different OEMs. What I admire about Nutanix is that they really have very good support. That is one of the greatest things that puts Nutanix ahead of its competitors. It is 24x7 support, and its SLAs are very defined. Their guys are super technical and they take ownership of a case. In fact, as a customer, if I miss something, they will reach out to me. That is something I have not seen with many OEMs.

They also have something called Nutanix Insight. It is an integrated platform. Suppose there is a hard drive failure in our cluster. Their support will automatically know and they will dispatch the part, without even raising a ticket.

Positive

We had legacy infrastructure, including physical servers, storage, and network switches, from different OEMs: Dell, Cisco, HPE. We removed all of them and opted for Nutanix AHV.

We have two clusters. One is our single-node DR cluster and one is our main, four-node hospital cluster, which is our main site. The clusters are in the same city, about 10 kilometers apart.

The initial deployment was straightforward for us. Nutanix has many partners in India and they aligned us with one of those partners. The partner came to us and assessed our existing infrastructure and then set up our environment by converting our physical infrastructure to the ESXi. From the ESXi, they migrated our servers to Nutanix AHV. There was hardly any downtime during the migration process, and everything went smoothly.

It took around three weeks to complete the deployment. There were two people involved, one from the OEM and me.

The maintenance it requires is super low. It has a feature called LCM (life cycle manager). As an administrator, I just have to just see if an update is available and then click on Update. It automatically updates. Nothing else is required from us. When maintenance has to happen, our applications will automatically migrate to other servers and they'll keep on running. End-users will never notice when maintenance going on. There isn't a single challenge with updating. It is super easy.

Adding compute and storage on-demand is also super easy. If I have to add compute, I just have to buy a node and expand the cluster. That's it. It will auto-discover the node and add it. It is a live procedure, so our existing workload is never impacted.

We have seen return on investment because we don't have to pay maintenance costs for the different legacy OEMs that we removed. It has saved us about 45 percent.

In terms of total cost of operations, Nutanix has also helped us a lot because, now, a single administrator can take care of network, server, and storage, because it is a consolidated box. Previously, we needed different guys, one for servers, an expert for storage, and another for network. One person is now doing the job of three people.

We assessed many solutions including SimpliVity from HPE, VxRail from Dell, and AHV from Nutanix. We did a comparison and we found that Nutanix AHV fit our budget and our feature requirements.

I definitely recommend it and have done so to many of my peers in the industry. A few of those colleagues were super excited when they got an overview of the product.

We use the solution to make virtual machines. 

The tool's most valuable feature is the snapshot feature. It is very useful and convenient. 

Nutanix AHV Virtualization is easy to integrate with other systems. 

I must change the memory cards in at least two to three weeks. 

I have been working with the product for seven years. 

Nutanix AHV Virtualization is stable. I rate the product's stability an eight out of ten. 

Nutanix AHV Virtualization is scalable. I rate the solution's scalability an eight out of ten. 

I am satisfied with the partner company. 

Positive

I also use VMware, which is strong. However, Nutanix AHV Virtualization's UI is convenient. It is easy to create and delete VMs. 

Nutanix AHV Virtualization's impact on our company is good. It helps to save 30 percent of time. 

Nutanix AHV Virtualization is expensive. I rate it a six out of ten. 

I rate the overall product an eight out of ten. 

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

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

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

I have worked with Nutanix AHV Virtualization since 2015.

Nutanix AHV Virtualization is a stable solution.

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

The solution’s initial setup is easy.

Around 15 engineers are needed to deploy the solution.

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

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

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

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

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

Our primary use case is virtualization and Citrix Workload (VDI and SBC). 

Less clicks, more time, and more holidays. ;)

The main benefits are that it is easy to use, automation, VM-centric view, is low cost, secure, and provides high performance. 

There is no USB mapping at the moment. 

I have been using this solution since 2013. So, it's been over ten years now. 

I would rate the stability a ten out of ten.

I would rate the scalability a ten out of ten. We have around a hundred end customers and thousands of users. 

The customer service and support are the best. 

Positive

We use VMware vSAN also but we prefer Nutanix solution. We work on both solutions but we try to quit VMware vSAN for Nutanix solution.

The initial setup was easy and straightforward for me. It took a couple of minutes. 

We are the system integrators. So, we also provide maintenance for the solution. We have a team of up to ten engineers for many customers.  

We have seen ROI in terms of stability, performance, cost-saving and time-saving. 

The solution's licensing cost is nearly the same as the other solution. I would rate the pricing a seven out of ten, with one being expensive and ten being cheap.

We did not evaluate any other solution as Nutanix is simply the best.

I highly recommend using Nutanix to other users. Overall, I would rate the solution a ten out of ten.