I would like to compare Nutanix and HPE SimpliVity. On what basis should I decide?

It depends very much on your use case. When I look at HP, they position their HCI offer primarily in the ROBO space for enterprise DC solutions. HP pushes its Synergy platform. Nutanix is well positioned in the data center space and has made huge strides there whilst HPE has lost a little bit of momentum with their HCI offer.
You need to be aware that the native Nutanix hypervisor has its limitations which could force you to complement the stack with HyperV or VMware driving up your cost. For instance, synchronous mirroring is not supported yet by AHV. Depending on your use case and the existing license base, you might want to include other alternatives in your comparison.

I will explain why HPE SimpliVity should be chosen compared to Nutanix.

1. Stability:
For HPE SimpilVity, configure RAID to protect the second level data. It implements the HW RAID + RAIN architecture.

In the case of Nutanix, it is RAIN architecture that does not configure HW RAID. Therefore, to ensure data availability (disk failure, node failure), it must be configured to RF 3 or higher. In order to configure RF = 3, unnecessary budget investment, which requires a configuration of at least five nodes, will occur. If you configure three Nutanix nodes, only two failures will affect the entire service.

2. Performance:
HPE SimpilVity requires sufficient memory resources to run the Management VM (OVC). However, service response is very fast through the IO Accelerator card. Ensure performance for backup and recovery or cloning operations in 1-TB VMs in just one minute.
Can Nutanix ensure that cloning or VM cloning for a 1TB VM can be completed in less than a minute? I have never been told to guarantee it.
HPE SimpilVity's philosophy is "Best IO is Zero IO."

3. Manageability:
Because HPE Simplicity is a plug-in to VMware vSphere by default, it provides a single GUI View of x86 servers, hypervisors, software-defined storage, and backup and disaster recovery solutions that make up a hyperconverged infrastructure, and VMware vSphere Web Client Integrated operation management. However, Nutanix (with VMware vSphere) requires separate management tools for x86 server management, separate hypervisor, backup and disaster recovery solutions.

4. Built-in data protection:
HPE SimpilVity has built-in data protection by default. Therefore, there is no need for a separate backup server, backup software, disk backup device, etc. for data protection. This means you do not need to invest in a separate IT budget to protect your data. In addition, just 1 minute is enough time to backup or restore 1TB. And backup client licenses are unlimited.

5. Reliable x86 servers, market-proven x86 servers:
There are a lot of security risks such as hacking and data leakage using security vulnerabilities of HW Firmware level recently. HW Firmware level spy chip issues, such as hacking and data leakage accidents due to security issues of Firmware level of Apple's Super Microserver. HPE SimpilVity's basic HW products are the world's best-selling DL 380 products, and the DL380Gen10 has enhanced security features to prevent security attacks at HW Firmware level that are not available in other companies. In addition, for x86 server consolidation, or especially for VDI configurations, you should choose HPE SimpliVity, which is highly data efficient and built-in data protection.
"We can recover all services in 10 minutes when the entire service is stopped due to Ransomware attacks."

You should also consider a few basic details:
- What is the hypervisor that you are going to use? If it's VMware then both of them are good. AHV has limitations and I have seen my customers suffering as they grow. Do not use AHV, let them refine it more.
- Do you want a hardware independent solution? If so, then HPE SimpliVity is out. If you are paying for 3-5 years of support, services, warranty, and licenses then it is irrelevant.
- Accelerator card - one more point of failure apart from OVC with Nutanix is that it is only Acropolis.
- High Availability - Nutanix is faster doing fail-overs
- Backup - more or less the same on esxi platform.
- Replication - Nutanix is better doing replication between the sites and is easy too.
- Storage Cost: Sales team of both the products lie when it comes to tell you how much they are going to consume. But with SimpliVity, at least in their config, they keep around 100-200GB of RAM for buffer.
- Performance - Both the platforms with identical hardware offer more or less the same performance. With SimpliVity, the OAC really gives you a good performance.
- Support - Nutanix is better, no doubts. When SimpliVity used to be SimpliVity, they had good support services.
- Containers - Better to work on Nutanix, however, if you are going to use vRealize Automation then both are OK.

If you like doing stuff by yourself and are well versed with VMware products, then try VMware vSAN with vSAN ready nodes and you will be amazed. Check each and everything that Nutanix salespeople say on the internet.

Similar to Mikes comments above, we evaluated both these products and Cisco Hyperflex and ended up selecting Nutanix. Our legacy platform was all HPE so they had the foot in the door from the start, however, it soon became clear that the roadmap for HPE is vague with SimpliVity and whilst it had some advantages over the others, they were few and relatively minor in our selection criteria. We needed a platform to support HyperV and whilst all three could do this, HPE could only support this with SimpliVity on a very expensive configuration that commercially blew them out the process quite early. Cisco had a good offering and could potentially deliver a good solution although whilst they challenged regularly, we still felt they were playing catch-up in this space. There is a good reason why Nutanix is selling HCI platforms in large numbers and why Gartner ranks them top in the Magic Quadrants, the key differentiator for us was the overall approach to whole lifecycle and support offering that came with the product. Something I think that Cisco and HPE need to take a step back and look at more with customers as well as their technology offerings.

Avoid the vendor lock-in at all costs. The hypervisor hardware and cloud connectors must not have limitations. The solution should be able to support multiple hypervisors and not be limited to one per cluster. The solution should be able to run on any x86 manufacturer. The vendor’s NPS score should be above 80. To avoid as much east-west traffic, the solution must support data locality.

HPE, in my personal research opinion, is struggling to gain momentum within the HCI space. The move from a dedicated hardware card to software enablement was a good move. Yet it does bring the question of do I want to move to an HCI partner that now runs on V1 release software? Do I want to work through the bug list to help HPE improve a product? Financially the product brings no benefit over the other HCI players.

Nutanix for me would be the preferred HCI product between these two. Reasons would be because of multiple stable releases and continued growth. I can choose which Hypervisor I want to run be it AHV, HyperV or VMware. I can also change at any stage should I wish to do so. I could transform applications in AHV using containers and spin up my dev workloads there. In the interim business, I can continue running on the hypervisor trusted for workloads while the teams build confidence using AHV. Nutanix is now focusing on feature richness and transformational approaches while allowing you to choose your hardware vendor of choice with full support.

The negativity of Nutanix is that you pay double hypervisor costs to do the same thing. When acquiring Nutanix, make use of AHV and the strength of the base integration. Thus drop VMware which scares most enterprises, unfortunately. HyperV is not largely adopted in many enterprises thus the double bill on hypervisor is not so bad. Yet when moving to Azure or AWS the hypervisor is not a consideration for technical staff.

I chose hyperconverged infrastructure because I think it is simply focusing on the value of the enterprise business as it is simply transforming the complexities of traditional data centers.

I think that it should not lack performance, stability, and manageability if it is made simple. The criteria that companies choose are market valuation, HCI data stability, and ease of management.

The unique value of HPE SimpilVity, the largest with other manufacturers, is data efficiency and built-in data protection. This value lies in the basic philosophy of HPE SimpliVity. That's "Best IO is Zero IO." And, HPE SimpliVity supports multi-hypervisors. (VMware vSphere, MS Hyper-V)

You'll notice that HPE doesn't really talk that much about SimpliVity anymore. They also signed a global agreement in April to run AHV (Acropolis Hypervisor) on HPE hardware for their hybrid cloud offering. Makes you wonder why they wouldn't use SimpliVity as the platform for that.

Truth is, SimpliVity had some good features (scalable compute, erasure coding and insane data reduction). However, it's limited to VMware for a hypervisor and the impressive data reduction algorithms absolutely kill performance.

On the other hand, Nutanix runs on multiple hypervisors and hardware platforms. Plus AHV has a multitude of features that improve efficiency and performance. And it's going to be around awhile.

The advantage that Nutanix has over SimpliVity is that it is a distributed storage fabric that runs in the application space and is not dependent on any single brand of hypervisor. Nutanix can run on VMware, Hyper-V, KVM or Nutanix’s own Acropolis hypervisor. Nutanix is a scalable software solution whereas SimpliVity is a hardware solution dependent on a specialized ASIC. You can run Nutanix on IBM, HPE, Dell or just about any commodity hardware and the user interface is very simple. Also, with the hyper convergence controller (CVM) decoupled from the hypervisor and hardware, updating Nutanix is non-disruptive.

Nutanix is the only SW based HCI vendor in the market today giving customers the freedom of choice. You can deploy our HCI SW on your choice of hardware and hypervisor (we also have our own KVM-based hypervisor that is included with the product). Whereas with SimpliVity, you are tied to HP and VMware. What if you deploy on HP today and your organization makes a strategic choice to change to Dell, Cisco or Fujitsu? Nutanix is the only vendor that allows you to port your licenses between different HW vendors.

Doesn’t hurt that we already created the HCI space and are the leaders. HP is also one of our close partners so you can deploy Nutanix on Proliant.

In a Nutshell, to keep it simple, they are both SaaS (Storage as a Service) Solutions in a sense, but SimpliVity is “ONLY” SaaS locked on HPE serves and no awareness of Hypervisor metrics, whereas Nutanix is best suited to different workloads that REALLY traverse all the realms of Hyperconverged technologies, from Data Center Consolidation/Migration, to VM consolidation reducing the “V-Tax” that come with different Hypervisor offerings (Nutanix is shipped with free AHV), to specific workloads with NO guess-work like VDI or Kubernetes in-premise cloud.

So my take is make a list of what you need and then compare apples to apples, two hints:

1. Check this document www.enterprisestorageforum.com
2. Try our sizing online tool to Assess: sizer.nutanix.com

If you feel you have more questions, take your time to touch base with representatives alternatively, just one note, at Nutanix, because we USE hypervisors to deliver our Storage Controller, we have a unique insight of HOW different workloads behave for different customers, and that gives us an advantage on what we are able to do for them, whilst an ONLY SaaS solution is one that will only give you yet another tool to optimize your workloads. It is up to you to figure out HOW that set of resources benefit your specific needs.

You should consider a few basic details:
- Hypervisor – AHV vs VMWARE. Although VMWARE is a master in virtualization, for start-ups, AHV can server the purpose (commercial impact).
- Hardware independent solution- If so, then Nutanix is a good option.
- High Availability - Nutanix is faster doing fail-overs.
- Replication - Nutanix is better doing replication between the sites.
- Storage Cost: SimpliVity keep aprox. 100-200GB of RAM for buffer.
- Support - Nutanix is better, no doubt. When SimpliVity used to be SimpliVity, they had good support services.
- Containers - Better to work on Nutanix, however, if you are going to use vRealize Automation then both are OK.

I agree with Shu and Mike. There is a lot more support and more features that Nutanix provides than any other HCI. There are not hardware complexities like in SimpliVity. You can use any vendor of your choice and go with Nutanix HCI, also use one hypervisor for production and another for DR. A way to save costs on a DR hypervisor is to use AHV in production and use VMware or Hyper-V based on your choice. Nutanix also provides native file services for connecting to physical servers, data protection services including DR, which I prefer most. Lately, Nutanix supports even SAP HANA-like workloads.

You should make a final decision based on your requirement, present pain points, specific features on HCI that can help to address any or all of your pain points.

Agree to everything Shu has said. HPE has announced a partnership with Nutanix, that has to be a sign of what's to come for SimpliVity. Nutanix has done a good job of acquiring companies that add value to their portfolio. They have also come a long way with their built-in hypervisor AHV. It has a lot of the same basic functionalities of VMware.

Nutanix is a more enterprise-based solution that is more robust. Have you considered VMware vSAN or Dell VxRail? VMware vSAN can run on their existing servers which eliminates the need for a hardware purchase.