IT Systems administrator at a government with 501-1,000 employees
Real User
Top 20
Improved our uptime: storage, network, and compute are always on; and helps us manage snapshots for protection
Pros and Cons
  • "The biggest plus that I want to commend them for is definitely their one-click update/upgrade feature. I use Prism for that and it's so amazing. That, by itself, is a selling point."
  • "I wish the main landing page, the dashboard, could be organized in a way where, when there is an alert because something is wrong, I would not have to click three or four times to get to what actually happened. I wish it were quicker to get to the bottom of the problem."

What is our primary use case?

We're using Nutanix as our main computing platform and we're using Prism with it. It's the Nutanix management UI and we're using it to manage the Nutanix cluster comprised of four physical servers. It's a single pane for management, and we're doing upgrades, updates, management, and protection, everything, through Prism. It's a really convenient interface.

We run it in our own server room in our on-prem facility.

How has it helped my organization?

The effect of Nutanix on our organization has been day and night. Our organization is a local municipal center. When I joined the city, that's when Nutanix arrived. It was sitting in the shipping room. Prior to my arrival, I was told our uptime was not solid. We would have outages left and right. Servers would go down because it was a three-tier architecture with SAN, a one-gig network, and a hodgepodge of pizza-box servers.

By implementing Nutanix, and consolidating all workloads into its cluster, we have protected those workloads in that one cluster. Storage-wise, network-wise, and compute-wise, we're always on. We haven't had downtime ever since we moved to Nutanix, zero, except for the power outages we had. There has been nothing wrong on the Nutanix side. We get good feedback from the business. They have recognized the high uptime and reliable service IT is providing and it is mainly due to implementing Nutanix.

We're small, so I'm the only sysadmin working in Prism, but it has cut down my management and maintenance time. In terms of help desk operations, it has also worked well. When I get a request to operate on the virtual machines, I can do it through Prism Central or vCenter, which is easy and saves time.

I am also our data protection "team," so I manage backups. Nutanix's data protection, based on snapshot architecture, has been our number-two solution. Our first go-to is the Rubrik backup system against ransomware attacks. The second thing I would fall back on is our Nutanix data protection snapshot. We have at least two layers that help us to sleep better.

What is most valuable?

The biggest plus that I want to commend them for is definitely their one-click update/upgrade feature. I use Prism for that and it's so amazing. That, by itself, is a selling point.

Another feature I use heavily is the data protection. I log into Prism to schedule a snapshot to be taken of our virtual machines at different intervals. That means we take more frequent snapshots of critical workloads, while less critical are done once a day. I set the schedule to retain the snapshots for a certain amount of time, and then they age out, so they don't take up extra space. All that is done through Prism.

And the user interface of Prism in the single pane of glass is very intuitive. I use it to look at the health aspect of our system. You don't have to go through a manual to figure things out. Their dev team has done a really good job of arranging things in the UI. I like it. It's very simple to use.

Deploying virtual machines is also very easy and intuitive.

We're not using the microsegmentation, but the physical and virtual aspects of the networking are very clear and easy to understand.

What needs improvement?

There is some room for improvement. I wish the main landing page, the dashboard, could be organized in a way where, when there is an alert because something is wrong, I would not have to click three or four times to get to what actually happened. I wish it were quicker to get to the bottom of the problem.

Buyer's Guide
Nutanix Prism
May 2024
Learn what your peers think about Nutanix Prism. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2024.
771,212 professionals have used our research since 2012.

For how long have I used the solution?

We have been using Prism for three-plus years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The stability of Prism is very good. I give it a nine out of 10.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

We started out with three nodes and scaled out by adding a fourth. That process was pretty painless. The scalability is very good.

How are customer service and support?

Their tech support is good. They're technical and knowledgeable.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We were using single servers and VMware vSAN, and that VMware setup was a disaster. I hated it with a passion. It was going down left and right. Granted, we were on the first generation of vSAN. Hopefully, they improved it. But with the version that we deployed, vSAN was very unreliable, and I just want to get away from it. It was terrible. I would spend hours and hours on the phone with VMware technicians and they still couldn't get it right.

How was the initial setup?

I helped install and configure Nutanix. We went through professional services and it was done within half a day. For us, it was a straightforward, easy setup. We have it deployed in a single location, taking up four Us, one U for each node, and they're connected to the 10-gig switch.

In terms of maintenance, we haven't had to do almost anything.

What about the implementation team?

We used Lanair Technology Group.

What was our ROI?

In the past three years, it has definitely been worth the money because we haven't put in any extra money to fix or buy anything additional due to something negative about Prism or it lacking in any aspect. 

Also, although we have been running VMware on Nutanix over those three years, Nutanix has proven itself so well that we are trying to get off of VMware. That means we'll be saving the cost of the VMware license once we do so.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The pricing was decent, average. It wasn't a Black Friday sale, but it was good.

What other advice do I have?

I looked at their new offering called Nutanix Cloud Clusters (NC2) on Azure. And I like what I'm seeing, so I have a meeting set up this afternoon to speak with their subject matter expert on that topic. That may be down the road for us. Currently, we don't have their cloud service.

I would advise others to consider Nutanix and give it a try. It's a really good solution, especially for small to medium-sized organizations, and definitely for VDI. 

However, there was a "gotcha" for us. Do understand that the management overhead is pretty big. About 25 to 30 percent is consumed off the bat by their management called CVM. That means that 25 to 30 percent of the memory and CPU that you buy are gone. So make sure you size it properly, with that in mind.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
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Shahriyar Atayev - PeerSpot reviewer
Senior System Administrator at a financial services firm with 501-1,000 employees
Real User
Top 5Leaderboard
Better performance than VMware, and provides good visibility into our networks
Pros and Cons
  • "Prism Central is a single point to manage every cluster. Everything can be managed in one panel. Everything is there on the main page of the dashboard."
  • "Sometimes the life cycle management function of Nutanix can't find the latest version of the firmware. The lifecycle management product could be more up-to-date."

What is our primary use case?

We use it as a private cloud for all of our IT infrastructure, including all the virtual machines for every project. We use it for workflow automation for Kubernetes. Nutanix has automation of Kubernetes clusters, and this is a very important use case for us.

It is used in our organization for every system and application: Oracle Database CDB, security systems, and local systems like our antivirus security system, Active Directory, and our finance system.

We have Nutanix in our main office, and two disaster sites. We run our workloads in a data center where there are physical servers and nodes.

How has it helped my organization?

We get better performance from Nutanix than we had with VMware. Our applications work very fast now and that is good for the applications team. Our customers are happy.

What is most valuable?

Among the most valuable features are the

  • reporting
  • Nutanix Files
  • Nutanix Calm
  • Nutanix Flow.

Also, Prism Central is a single point to manage every cluster. Everything can be managed in one panel. Everything is there on the main page of the dashboard.

It also provides good visibility into our networks.

In addition, because Nutanix has cost management abilities, we can see how to optimize the capacity of our Nutanix products. We know when our storage will run out and when we need to buy more. This is good for the efficiency of our IT organization. The capacity planning is good. I would say it has improved our IT efficiency by 30 percent.

We have a data protection team and Nutanix Data Protector is good. It really helps by taking snapshots in a short time. Our data protection team's efficiency has improved by about 50 percent.

The security of the solution is also good.

What needs improvement?

The processing of updates and upgrades could be faster.

Also, sometimes the life cycle management function of Nutanix can't find the latest version of the firmware. The lifecycle management product could be more up-to-date.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have worked with Nutanix for more than five years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It is very stable. We haven't had any issues with the stability.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

It is scalable.

How are customer service and support?

Every system, of course, has some issues, but every ticket we open is resolved by Nutanix support via the Nutanix portal. The support is really good. We don't have any problems with their support or any unresolved issues.

Yearly, we have a maximum of 10 support tickets.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Previously, we used VMware ESXi and we migrated to Nutanix because it has better performance and functions, as well as new features. We see it as more stable than the VMware products we used, and more secure. The user interface is also simpler. We chose it and we like it.

It also provides a simple migration process from VMware to Nutanix. We used the new Nutanix Move product and it resulted in a simple migration of the virtual machines from the other infrastructure to Nutanix.

How was the initial setup?

The deployment was complex. We have more than one installation for different projects, but the first time, for our blockchain project, it took approximately two weeks. 

However, it is simpler for new staff to learn Nutanix than to learn other products.

The system is used by our network admin, application admin team, and database team. There are 10 administrators.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The price and licensing policies are advantageous. The pricing is better than our previous product. Management uses the portal to track the licenses and for cost management and it is better than our previous product.

What other advice do I have?

I would definitely recommend Nutanix Prism.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
PeerSpot user
Buyer's Guide
Nutanix Prism
May 2024
Learn what your peers think about Nutanix Prism. Get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions. Updated: May 2024.
771,212 professionals have used our research since 2012.
Manager IT Security & Infrastructure at Currimjee Jeewanjee & Co. Ltd.
Real User
Top 10
Great dashboards, helpful support, and good reliability
Pros and Cons
  • "It is stable and reliable."
  • "The pricing could be improved."

What is our primary use case?

We have been using Nutanix Prism to manage a whole cluster to manage old VMs and the object inside the Nutanix and it has been very easy since we have a very beautiful dashboard that gives quite a lot of information about the CPU replacement or storage use. 

What is most valuable?

The main dashboard itself has been very helpful. If we ever have any issues, we are able to get back on the dashboard to take a look. The management is very easy with Nutanix. With such a dashboard where you have all the visibility you need - including access to alerts or issues, you have great control. 

The setup is simple. 

The solution is scalable. 

It is stable and reliable. 

What needs improvement?

The pricing could be improved. We'd like it if they offered some sort of discount for returning users. 

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using the solution for six or seven years at this point. It's been a while since we began using it. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

The solution is very stable and reliable. The performance is good. There are no bugs or glitches and it doesn't crash or freeze. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The product is scalable. It's no problem if you want to expand it. 

We have about six users on the solution. They are from the IT department. 

How are customer service and support?

Technical support is good. Once you initiate contact, they will work with you and sort out the issue. They are responsive and knowledgeable. 

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

Beforehand, we used VMware. We had been using VMware for nine years or somewhere around that length of time. Then, we shifted from VMware to Nutanix.

How was the initial setup?

It is a straightforward setup. It's not overly complex or very difficult to manage. 

We had some engineers manage the process. Having it done by a professional engineer ensures everything runs quite smoothly. 

For the deployment, there was only one or two staff involved. We now have five staff members who are well trained on Nutanix we are able to do some daily management duties every day. They are engineers. 

What about the implementation team?

We did have outside help from an integrator during the setup process. 

We did buy the software with that integrator. We had the installation and configuration, et cetera, handled with their help.

What was our ROI?

I don't have any details in regard to any ROI. 

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

We pay for the solution on a yearly basis. 

What other advice do I have?

I'm a customer and end-user. 

We are using the latest version of the solution. 

I'd recommend the solution to others. 

I'd rate the solution nine out of ten. 

Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
PeerSpot user
GreigEbeling - PeerSpot reviewer
Soltion Architect at Datacom
Reseller
Top 5
Offers webscaling and high performance with easy maintenance
Pros and Cons
  • "Nutanix Prism offers web scaling, which facilitates easy scaling."
  • "There can be some constraints on how it scales, making granular scaling difficult with the product."

What is our primary use case?

We primarily use the solution as a virtual platform. It serves as a server storage solution for creating a virtual platform.

What is most valuable?

Nutanix Prism offers web scaling, which facilitates easy scaling. However, it is expensive. It provides high performance, which is attributed to data locality. It also supports scale-up storage and RAM, allowing for flexible expansion within the box. Other vendors like VxRail and Azure Stack do not offer this capability. It has comprehensive management and reporting functionalities integrated into the product. Managing virtual machines on Nutanix is much easier than VMware or Hyper-V clusters.

What needs improvement?

The solution is fairly expensive, especially in comparison to three-tier solutions. There can be some constraints on how it scales, making granular scaling difficult with the product. While purchasing, you must decide on the performance and capacity you want to build into the system. Once you've built it, it's difficult to change, whether increasing performance or adjusting to changed circumstances.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Nutanix Prism for 7 years.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The solution works with all types of customers, from small to enterprise.

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

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

I have used VxRail and SimpliVity. We switched to Nutanix for better performance, easier management, and better support.

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup is easy and takes days to a week, depending on what you make.

What other advice do I have?

The maintenance is very easy.

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

Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Reseller
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Infrastructure Architect at a manufacturing company with 5,001-10,000 employees
Real User
Top 10
Makes it much easier to build and maintain our test, dev, and prod environments, and saves time managing hardware
Pros and Cons
  • "What I like the most are the self-healing and the ability to see everything at a glance, from metrics to the resiliency status of the hardware. As soon as you log in, that's what you see."
  • "We're running VMware's ESX hypervisor and a lot of networking isn't done in Prism, it's done at the vCenter level. But for the few proofs of concept that I've done, Prism hasn't been a good experience because there's a lot of command-line work that needs to be done to configure the network."

What is our primary use case?

We use it for managing the cluster and all the hardware that goes with it, as well as for updates, management, and the whole lifecycle of the hardware. That's all done through Prism Element.

We run it in data centers and we use it for big data, ERP, SQL Databases, Exchange Servers, and file servers. Pretty much everything that can be virtualized is running on Nutanix.

How has it helped my organization?

Prism has made it much easier to build and maintain our test, dev, and production environments, all of which run on Nutanix. And there have definitely been a lot of time savings when it comes to updating and managing the hardware itself.

It's also allowed us to standardize. We are pushing a lot of the traditional three-tier infrastructure to Nutanix, mainly because it provides single pane of glass management for all hardware. You don't have to deal with different vendors to upgrade or maintain versions of firmware. You just log in to Prism Element, upgrade everything, and it takes care of the whole upgrade process for you. You don't have to speak to different vendors to find out what's compatible with what. It has made everyone's lives, and mainly mine, easier, particularly when it comes to managing hardware life cycles.

It has helped with our IT management efficiency because we do it all from Prism. You don't have to log in to different consoles to perform upgrades. We've gone through a few terrible products before, so in terms of time, it has probably increased efficiency threefold. There's no research that you have to do. It just works.

In addition, we use Nutanix as a dedicated platform for hosting our security infrastructure. They call it free. You pay for it, but there are free hypervisors. That's one less layer of complexity for managing the security infrastructure.

What is most valuable?

What I like the most are the self-healing and the ability to see everything at a glance, from metrics to the resiliency status of the hardware. As soon as you log in, that's what you see.

With Prism Element, you can do just about everything from a single console. The user experience of the console in Prism depends on what we are doing, but overall, if we bundle together everything that we could possibly do in it, I would give it eight and a half out of 10.

And as you are building out things like protection domains, it lets you see what's connected to what. It lets you visualize where particular applications or particular VMs sit: in which groups, on which cluster and, ultimately, where they would end up if you were to activate a protection domain or migrate workloads across. And in terms of hardware, there's a diagram view that lets you see which disks and which hosts sit on which boxes, what belongs to which models, and the associated serial numbers as well. It does a pretty good job of helping you visualize.

What needs improvement?

We're running VMware's ESX hypervisor and a lot of networking isn't done in Prism, it's done at the vCenter level. But for the few proofs of concept that I've done, Prism hasn't been a good experience because there's a lot of command-line work that needs to be done to configure the network. The experience with networking hasn't been great. I'm not a big fan of running things on the command line, just because I know for a fact that it can be done easily in something like VMware. They've done a great job of that. I hope that, one day, Nutanix can replicate that experience.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Nutanix Prism for about seven years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It's very stable.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The scalability is one of the best features.

How are customer service and support?

Their support is pretty much the benchmark I use when I deal with other vendors. Nutanix support is one of the few vendors that gives you direct access to what they call level-three support. You're not working with a person doing triage who then escalates to someone else who can help. The first person you talk to is the person who will be able to log in and help you dive into the issue.

They're the best I've seen.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We were a big Dell shop, and we used HPE and IBMs back then. There was a whole mix of hardware to build up a solution. At the time, Nutanix was very compelling. Our existing hardware, the server switches and the SAN storage arrays, had come to end-of-life.

The Nutanix pricing, at the time, was very competitive. It was almost on par with buying brand-new servers and brand-new storage arrays. And at the same time, the cost savings were in the management of the hardware. With Nutanix, you could do everything from the one console that is Prism Element. The cost savings weren't so much when buying the hardware, they were from the reduced cost due to the time saved when managing it.

How was the initial setup?

The initial deployment is pretty straightforward now, but mainly because I know what I'm doing. But initially, it was confusing, and my advice to new customers would be to always engage with Nutanix for first builds. You can't just power it on and expect it to work straight away. But Nutanix has come a long way since the early days when you had to use the command line to build it out.

The time it takes to deploy depends on how prepared you are. You have to get all the networking done prior to kicking off the deployment. It also depends on how big the cluster is. If we're talking about the most basic, three-node deployment, it would probably take two to three hours. You unbox it, rack it, cable it up, and then you need to image the nodes with a laptop. I was the only one involved in the deployment on our side.

The few members of our staff who know how to use it went on a three-day course to learn the administration side of it. I don't know of anyone who just dives straight in, because we don't want them to break anything.

In Australia, we have about three people who log in to it. In the US, there are about five, and in Europe, there are about three. There are two of us involved in the maintenance and some of the responsibilities include logging in, triggering firmware updates, host upgrades, and hypervisor upgrades.

What was our ROI?

For the first couple of years, we did see return on investment but, over time, those returns diminished because of the price increases.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

The licensing aspect is painful. We are told, "This is when you have to renew. This is the serial number and the part number," et cetera. But it's difficult to know where something belongs unless you dive into the portal and search in multiple areas for a particular serial number. The experience over the years hasn't been great with renewing, and knowing what you're renewing.

Also, there seems to be a year-on-year increase of about 5 percent. It doesn't seem like they really reward loyal customers. New customers don't get that penalty, but as you're renewing each year, you get a cost increase, which we're not happy about.

The network visibility and microsegmentation of Nutanix Prism is a feature we don't use. It's an additional feature that you have to pay for.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We looked at moving things to Azure. We also looked at SimpliVity. The other option was simply to buy brand-new hardware from Dell, IBM, or HPE again. We went with Nutanix because of the price and features.

What other advice do I have?

Always work closely with a technical account manager and the sales engineer. If you're deploying from new, or even as a proof of concept, there is a lot of terminology and a lot of functions and features that are new for someone coming from traditional, three-tier architecture. Work closely with them, familiarize yourself with it, and get into a course.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
PeerSpot user
Vishwambhar Bandal - PeerSpot reviewer
Assistant Vice President at IndusInd Bank ltd
Real User
Top 5Leaderboard
A very user-friendly UI with a centralized console; offers a lot of features and software
Pros and Cons
  • "Has a user-friendly UI with a centralized console."
  • "Performance metrics and analytics could be improved."

What is our primary use case?

I'm the assistant vice president and we are Nutanix partners.

What is most valuable?

Prism has a user-friendly UI with a centralized console. It offers a lot of features and software. 

What needs improvement?

Performance metrics and analytics could be improved. 

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using this solution for two years. 

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

We have not faced any stability issues from the Nutanix side. 

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

The solution is easily scalable, we have around 200 IT users. 

How are customer service and support?

We have engagement with the India support team, which is a dedicated team and we have a weekly scheduled call with the ITM. We go over any tech issues or additional services they suggest and can apply. This helps us with our regulatory reporting. 

How was the initial setup?

The initial setup was simple because we had an ESX deployment at the hypervisor level. It was simple because of DVR and we use a private cloud environment that is a VRA. We now have around 60 nodes in our production setup.

Which other solutions did I evaluate?

We compared Nutanix with VMware. VMware has the VRA as an automation tool and Nutanix has an ERA cloud automation tool. Nutanix offers a lot of software including the automation cloud tool and networking tools as well. It's good for Microsoft segmentation and very competitive with VMware.

What other advice do I have?

I rate the solution nine out of 10. 

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: My company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Partner
PeerSpot user
System Administrator at a government with 11-50 employees
Real User
Top 20
A scalable, fast, and effective solution with fast support
Pros and Cons
  • "Its scalability is valuable. It's scalable and fast."
  • "The VM backup could be better, and its licensing could be better. We have had some licensing issues with Nutanix Files. The default license should be 1 TB or more. Currently, for Nutanix Files sharing, we can only use 500 Gigabytes."

How has it helped my organization?

We are running our workloads or applications on the data center. It's very effective.

It saved our time. It has improved the efficiency of our organization’s IT management by 40% to 50%. It has also improved the efficiency of our organization’s data protection teams, but it hasn't improved the efficiency of our organization’s help desk operations.

It has improved the productivity of our organization’s application developers by 40%.

It has reduced the management overhead costs through self-service. It also has had an effect on our security posture.

It hasn't offered a single-pane-of-glass user experience.

What is most valuable?

Its scalability is valuable. It's scalable and fast.

The Nutanix Prism user interface is also good.

What needs improvement?

The VM backup could be better, and its licensing could be better. We have had some licensing issues with Nutanix Files. The default license should be 1 TB or more. Currently, for Nutanix Files sharing, we can only use 500 Gigabytes.

For how long have I used the solution?

I've been using this solution for two years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

It's stable.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

Its scalability is good. We are currently using it at one location. We have plans to increase its usage.

How are customer service and support?

They are helpful. When we open a ticket, they respond very fast. If needed, they send us RAM or hard disk, and we then change it. I'd rate them a nine out of ten.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?

We used Microsoft Hyper-V. We moved to Nutanix because of more flexibility and stability. 

The onboarding experience of Nutanix Prism is better than our previous solution. Nutanix is also fast. We can create a virtual machine in a second. It's a very fast solution.

How was the initial setup?

Its configuration took two to three days. It does require maintenance. Without maintenance, it wouldn't work.

What about the implementation team?

It was installed by another organization. There were two engineers involved in its deployment. One was from the network side, and the other one was from the systems side.

What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?

Microsoft Hyper-V is free, whereas Nutanix isn't. Nutanix isn't so expensive. VMware is more expensive than Nutanix, but with VMware, there aren't many licenses, whereas, in the case of Nutanix, we need to upgrade the license periodically. It could be every three years or five years. It depends on your license.

There are no costs in addition to the licensing fee.

What other advice do I have?

I'd recommend this solution. I'd rate it a nine out of ten.

Which deployment model are you using for this solution?

On-premises
Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor. The reviewer's company has a business relationship with this vendor other than being a customer: Prtner
PeerSpot user
Senior Infrastructure Engineer at a educational organization with 1,001-5,000 employees
Real User
Top 20
Insights into utilization, as well as availability forecast, help us manage storage efficiently
Pros and Cons
  • "It provides a single pane of glass and the graphics and the presentation are quite good. It's quite exciting for me. I would rate it 10 out of 10. The user interface is pretty easy to use for compute and storage."
  • "In our environment we are using it alongside VMware, so some integration with that would be nice. VMware has SHD (Skyline Health Diagnostics) which diagnoses health and gives suggestions. A plug-in for taking information out of it would be helpful."

What is our primary use case?

We use it for hyperconverged storage only. Prism is a gateway to Nutanix Elements and the latter shows me the storage. We run it on-premises in the data center in our building and it helps run education related applications like student management, databases,and time-tabling.

How has it helped my organization?

It gives me a centralized console for all my hosts. It's a single window to sign into and explore whatever has been configured.

From my point of view, it has just added complexity, to be honest, but I like the way the extra layers have been added. It makes it complex, but it gives you the advantage of extra security. It's able to segregate spare storage from each host into a common pool, which can then be used in production.

And it has definitely helped the management of storage. Overall, it has helped improve the efficiency of our organization’s IT management by 40 percent. We haven't been adding capacity to the storage because it's giving us quite good insights into how much we've been utilizing and through the availability forecast.

What is most valuable?

One of the good features is that I tried a few firmware patches and updates and there was no downtime. There was one case where it prompted that it would cause an outage on the host, but I was able to just click and update everything else and it happened in the background without any impact on the production loads.

It provides a single pane of glass and the graphics and the presentation are quite good. It's quite exciting for me. I would rate it 10 out of 10. The user interface is pretty easy to use for compute and storage.

Prism is also quite comprehensive when it comes to reports. You can pretty much schedule and run reports of whatever you want. The reporting is already quite mature.   

What needs improvement?

In our environment we are using it alongside VMware, so some integration with that would be nice. VMware has SHD (Skyline Health Diagnostics) which diagnoses health and gives suggestions. A plug-in for taking information out of it would be helpful.

For how long have I used the solution?

I have been using Nutanix Prism for less than four months. Our organization has been using it for years.

What do I think about the stability of the solution?

One element has a full tolerance of two nodes, and two nodes were already in a failed state for quite a long time. Either we were lucky enough or it's been stable enough. So I would rate it at 50 percent for stability.

What do I think about the scalability of the solution?

I assume we can add hosts on the fly without impacting anything. It must be scalable, but I haven't looked into it.

There are another 20 ITOs/ITPs that are going to be merged into our wider organization. The intention is that we keep Nutanix and expand it to other organizations.

How are customer service and support?

Their technical support is excellent. I love it.

How would you rate customer service and support?

Positive

How was the initial setup?

I wasn't involved in the initial setup, but we have it in a single location and it is used by multiple departments with about 1,000 users.

What other advice do I have?

So far it has all been working beyond my expectations. Nutanix is disabling some of the backend SSH, so authentication and authorization are changing. It's definitely going to be in line with what most other vendors are doing. I see Microsoft disabling basic authentication and going into other kinds. It's keeping pace with the latest and emerging trends and technologies.

It's capable of auto-maintenance, but it does require some maintenance on my part. Over the past couple of weeks, when I log in to Prism, I have seen alerts, most of them automated messages about high utilization, but some of them have needed human intervention. We have a team of four involved in maintenance of the solution. I lead the team and the others have yet to dive into it. The entire team is pretty new.

Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.
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Buyer's Guide
Download our free Nutanix Prism Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.
Updated: May 2024
Buyer's Guide
Download our free Nutanix Prism Report and get advice and tips from experienced pros sharing their opinions.