Nutanix AHV vs. Scale Computing Platform

I think Nutanix AOS is a great product and, I would recommend it to anyone. The only reason I did not give it a 10 out of 10 is because I don't do that for any product. Every product has room for improvement.

Scale is best suited to environments that do not have excessive external or proprietary peripherals. Integrating with tape drive backups or robot tape libraries can be problematic. The most effective use of Scale systems is for companies running multiple instances of the same operating system. The hypervisor's code/file-sharing nature does an excellent job managing new instances while keeping the increase in storage to a minimum.

• One component to support both compute and storage needs for virtualization.
• Easy expandable as business needs arise both at the node level and larger with blocks.
• Well outlined interface with good historical data.
• API tools are available to obtain logging information from Nutanix that can be used with other monitoring tools such as Splunk.

Incentivized

• Simplicity - I do not have to create storage buckets or micromanage anything.
• Efficiency - Lower power use since moving to a hyperconverged environment.
• Scalability - Adding additional hardware is easy, and increasing things like the amount of RAM or number of cores is easy.

Incentivized

• Nutanix has a huge learning curve. We purchased the on-line training course when we moved to the platform and it was literally weeks of instruction. It was so extensive, in fact, that we ran out of time to complete it before the test.
• Operations that cannot be done from the browser require running commands from a terminal emulator; perhaps owing to the newness of the platform, documentation is not robust. I highly recommend you buy the tech support.
• Software updates are sometimes rushed to release. I've gotten to where I wait at least a few weeks after release before installing them, as I've run into significant issues with buggy software. Such installations have required time-consuming tech support calls to resolve.
• While the promise of perpetual VM uptime is being fulfilled, the dashboard frequently reports issues that need to be resolved.
• Because of significant hardware redundancy, the cost per byte of storage capacity is high.

Incentivized

• Dedicated Lights-Out Solution for low-end systems
• Ability to replace smaller storage drives with larger ones, rather than requiring the addition of an entire node for storage increases
• Different UI views for VMs: ability to minimize certain groups and have that persist through log-ins

We made a huge financial investment with this platform (four clusters, all-flash storage array), so we're in it for the long haul. Luckily it's a beast. I've had to use support more than any other platform I've administered, but the help has been very good. Nutanix continues to add features and innovations which increase the ROI

Incentivized

Since I have had no issues with downtime; easier management of my cluster and the ability to lower the number of devices in my Infrastructure, I will gladly renew my support contract with Scale Computing HC3 and upgrade my equipment with them when it comes time for it.

Incentivized

Nutanix Prism Element and Prism Central are easy-to-use HTML5-based web consoles. The layout makes sense; you're only a few clicks away from getting to where you need to be. The AHV hypervisor is integrated into the platform for a fast and seamless experience. Rich data on VM metrics is also available.

Incentivized

Everything you need to do is point-and-click easy. If you are the kind of admin who wants to edit every config file and endlessly customize your environment, then Scale may not be for you. On the other hand, if you just want it to work really well, and do what they told you it will do, then Scale is the ideal system.

Incentivized

Never had an outage or an error. Once a hard drive failed, but Scale kept on working flawlessly without interruption.

Incentivized

Due to the cool DFS architecture, Nutanix has good read performance for loads. In general, everything works well. We only ran into problems with very specific workloads that did not allow multithreading. It is also worth noting that loads should be tuned according to best practices for best performance, which is not always an easy task.

Incentivized

Performance has been just as outstanding as reliability. I have never experienced delays in any aspect of usage.

Incentivized

Nutanix [AOS] is a leader in the HCI industry and it becomes evident after deploying the software. The solution runs effortlessly and can scale seamlessly. We ran the Nutanix solution on Lenovo Servers and since Lenovo has a close working relationship with Nutanix, you can procure the Nutanix software directly from Lenovo as part of your Lenovo HCI solution. The advantage of going this route is that the hardware has been tested and verified by Lenovo that it is thus certified for Nutanix. The support is then also directly with Lenovo for both hardware and software.

Incentivized

They are very knowledgeable about their own products and hardware addressing my concerns or issues very quickly and on the first contact. Calls concerning VMware migrations and Acronis backup took a little more time for more complicated issues, but the Scale Computing Platform techs were diligent to stay on top of issues until they were resolved. Most of my issues have been with the initial setup/migration.

Incentivized

I did not do in-person training.

Incentivized

Because Scale is so simple, the training is just as quick and easy.

Incentivized

The implementation was very easy. We had Scale support on standby and they were ready and eager to help if needed. The process went so fast the employees in the organization did not even know it was done.

Incentivized

We looked at both Simplivity and Cisco HyperFlex. Both are pretty good in their own right. Simplivity was very 'efficient' in the way they handled data, but we didn't like the idea of a propitiatory hardware card. Cisco's HyperFlex was our second choice, but we were so impressed with what Nutanix had done for us already, that we were already leaning toward that.

Incentivized

We previously used Microsoft Hyper V and VMWare and, before that, a room for single-purpose servers. My satisfaction with Scale is because it is a more straightforward product to install and use; it has incredible speed and reliability. In the past, getting support from Microsoft was labor intensive, and with VMWare, there was a language accent barrier.

Incentivized

HC3 is one of the best products I have purchased for our district. It is unbelievably reliable to the point that they shoot themselves in the foot on support contracts.

Incentivized

• Nutanix Beam helps enable enterprises to take control of their total cloud spend with automated cost governance policies. Beam provides unified visibility into public and private cloud spending, including clusters, VMs, and other services.
• Lower administrative overhead, increased employee productivity, and costs savings.
• Nutanix AHV is also generally free to use, which can benefit organizations with budget constraints.

Incentivized

• With the high cost of the leading competitor the savings starts day one and saves every year after.
• Scale can be administered by a tier one technician so cost of labor is reduced.
• If there is a problem like a cyber attack, the savings kick in with the least amount of downtime.

Incentivized