Nutanix AHV vs. VMware vSphere vs. VMware Workstation Pro

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.

vSphere is well suited for multiple VMWare hosts and can be very useful in larger enterprises where vMotion is used to load balance and failover running virtual machines. In smaller businesses with one or two hosts then the features can be overkill. The addition of virtual TPM support is a very nice addition to provide vm security in a more Microsoft supported methodology.

Incentivized

I would not recommend using a VM as a complete replacement for your everyday driver, but I would recommend
it for testing. One way that I use Workstation Pro is with testing GPO's. I can
make a change to a user or computer GPO, take a snapshot, reboot the computer
to pull the GPO, see if it worked. If it didn't, I revert to the last snapshot before the GPO was pulled, make some changes to the GPO again, and test on the test VM. The same style
of testing can be used with creating and changing scripts for computer changes.
We have a whole computer setup script that installs software and changes a ton
of settings. On a VM you can test over and over to make sure the script runs
how you want it to and revert if you didn't like the script outcome. Especially
handy with software installs, so you don't have to wait for a program to
uninstall and then edit the script and run the script again. Using snapshots save me so much time in testing!

Incentivized

• 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

• vMotion that provides seamless movement of Virtual Machines between physical hosts and datastores.
• Ease of Manage: vCenter provides very good management experience to the users.
• It provides hassle free upgrade of versions, which requires good planning.
• Easy to manage datastore, networks, CPU and memory resources.
• It also allows to convert the physical machine and bring it to vSphere Environment with minimum effort.

Incentivized

• It provides a great remote access tool for accessing and managing servers in virtual environment. With the security risks surround remote desktop this provides a good alternative to do the same functions.
• The app itself is very lightweight and easy to install/maintain.
• Sandbox testing can be a time consuming thing to setup and do. Workstation makes this easy to create, use, and put away. This make you more willing to put new things in the sandbox and test them before production usage.
• The cost of workstation is very affordable for the functionality that you get and you can try it for free before you buy it.
• We use it to run apps that can be difficult to setup or conflict with other apps. We just spin this app VM up run it, and then shut it back down. The startup and shutdown is very quick.

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

• Allow enable EVC without requiring host shutdown
• More detail in recent tasks. Instead of just showing a task called "Reconfigure virtual machine" also have a link to more detailed information as to what was reconfigured, changed or removed.
• Allow searching tasks or events

Incentivized

• At the moment, it's incompatible with Microsoft's HyperVM, which is used in Docker and the Linux Subsystem on Windows 2 (WSL 2).
• VMware shared files sometimes stop working and need to be reset.
• 3D support is limited to Windows and only certain scenarios.

Incentivized

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

We are constantly looking for change that will benefit our company. We are not ones to stick with a product simply because it is what we know, but rather looking for what fits us best. We can't imagine another product on the market today doing a better job of handling our infrastructure than vSphere.

It's a solid product, and if they make it compatible with HyperVM (WSL, Docker, etc.) it would be great

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

Very useful for environments where space and energy consumption are issues and management is not very keen on upfront spending on hardware every time whenever requirement comes from any dept for provisioning a machine for their occasional use, easily can be done in case of VMware vSphere in few clicks. Backup, security, monitoring and management everything is covered but at additional cost.

Incentivized

It is well documented since it is a long actor in the virtualization scene. Easy to use for most user cases. Pretty much not maintenance on the software besides the occasional software updates and/or compatibility issues from time to time.

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

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

I rarely ever have to contact support and when I do need to resolve an issue, there is always an abundance of kb articles and research information available that can help quickly resolve the issue. Depending on the type of support contract you have, you may get support from some offshore group in another country and this could be a little challenging because of the language barrier.

Incentivized

I haven't had to call VMware Workstation support. The majority of the time, whenever I have a problem, I can perform an online search and find the answers I need. Online forums and users with similar situations are generally sufficient to answer any questions I have had, though, from previous experience at another company, their support is outstanding and responsive to circumstances. However, that is generally for a paid support contract and should be expected when you are paying for that support.

Incentivized

Just make sure that when you implement, that the person implementing truly knows what they are doing and has a plan of action coming in. Since our initial implementation using a consulting service, I have implemented a few vSphere just from what I learned at the initial implementation and use over time, and the person implementing really needs to know what they are doing or you will miss out on features that may help you down the line

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

vSphere has a lot more feature sets than Hyper-V but at a much higher cost of entry versus MS Hyper-V. I have not been able to play with Hyper-V as much as I would have liked, but the setup and ongoing maintenance seems to be easier in vSphere than with Hyper-V

Incentivized

VMware ESXi is more enterprise based whereas VMware Workstation offers capabilities at a lower cost and smaller scale. VMware Workstation Pro is also user friendly and easy to install. It can be utilized on a regular desktop system as the name implies. It helps with also demonstrations when needed to clients without having bulky hardware every time.

Incentivized

The contract terms are very clear and can be updated as per the project requirement. Customer support is also included in the contract which help us to troubleshoot critical issues very easily. Training included in contract will really help the client team to empower and hands-on on the latest updates and enhancements

As I said earlier, they're always ready to understand our issues and propose the best and most appropriate solution for issues all the time. The security patches solution is accordingly to the business needs. Another scenario is their Knowledge Base where
they're many articles that help you in order to solve something which
is wrong.

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

• Having vSphere helped my business quickly recover from a ransomware attack which would have crippled us for weeks if we were not virtualized. I think the ROI on something like that is immeasurable.
• vSphere has allowed my company to purchase bigger server hardware to host 3 or 4 virtual servers, which was at a cost much lower than buying 3 or 4 server hardware boxes, saving us thousands each time we need to upgrade hardware.

Incentivized

• When updating multiple VM's, this is a much quicker option vs trying to either RDP to them or console using Vcenter
• We are required to run a VM locally for certain tasks, and this has been the most effective way to use it
• The ability to manage a VM without having to worry about the console freezing up helps with management

Incentivized