We performed a comparison between Cisco Hyperflex Hx Series and Nutanix Acropolis AOS based on our users’ reviews in four categories. After reading all of the collected data, you can find our conclusion below.
Comparison of Results: Based on the parameters we compared, Cisco Hyperflex Hx Series seems to be a superior solution. All other things being more or less equal, our reviewers found Nutanix Acropolis AOS to be more difficult to deploy than Cisco Hyperflex Hx Series. Additionally, Nutanix Acropolis AOS lacks the level of integration that Cisco offers.
"The main benefit is that StarWind is almost maintenance-free."
"They offer top-tier support."
"In the three years that we have been using StarWind, the product has yet to cause us any problems."
"The vSAN provides full redundancy for storage while reclaiming some rack space."
"StarWind Virtual SAN is essentially hardware agnostic, allowing us to build out a specific hardware layer based upon the customer's unique requirements."
"The fact that the solution is vendor-agnostic allows it to be used with any virtualization vendor while remaining a powerful abstraction over storage."
"Starwind support is excellent. They are very fast and have very good knowledge of Starwind and Hyper-V Cluster software."
"Besides being 80% cheaper than the other alternatives, the simplicity makes reconfiguration and support much easier."
"Offers very good data protection and provides system uptime availability effectively."
"It's very easy to integrate with the ACI network."
"The initial setup is easy."
"Great integration with backup software."
"We are providing this solution for the customer or converting the customer from a traditional environment to a hyper-converged environment which consolidates all management and support on a single port. This is the main benefit of using the hyper-converged versus the traditional."
"Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series is simple to use, user-friendly and has been best for our purposes."
"The technical support has been very good for this solution."
"It is very scalable. It is also very secure. Cisco's security portfolio is integrated with it, which makes it secure. It is a platform-based device. Its performance is also fairly good in comparison to any other solution."
"The pricing is pretty good."
"Its low maintenance is a key feature. It is easy to install, upgrade, and scale by adding more blocks."
"The feature that I have found most valuable is its software Move, which we use to migrate virtual info from another platform to the Nutanix platform."
"The features that I have found most valuable include its HA facility, viability, robustness, flexibility, it's time to go live is very short, and it has a friendly user interface."
"I have found the solution to be stable."
"The most valuable features of Nutanix Acropolis AOS are ease of management, hyper-convergence platform, and it has robust operations."
"The hyperconvergence service, as well as the DR solution, are game-changers for Nutanix."
"The initial setup was quite straightforward."
"The number of different ways you can set it up can make it a little daunting."
"Geolocation could be better, for example, for site mirroring for DR purposes."
"I found that certain browsers are not fully compatible with the administration web access portal."
"The main thing I would like to see improved is the level of documentation."
"The console is something that I feel could be improved. There is nothing technically wrong with it, but it can be jazzed up and/or made to be a little more intuitive."
"The setup and documentation for the installation with the free version could definitely be improved."
"I wish the sync after a failure, such as hardware failure or power-related issues, for example, was faster."
"There is no IPv6 support. That is our only issue at this time."
"Unlike other options, you need to pay a subscription to Cisco yearly instead of paying for the hardware outright, which makes it more expensive in the long run."
"HyperFlex could be improved by reducing the minimum number of nodes supported from three to two."
"In the next release, Cisco should add more integration and management capabilities as well as some tweaks to the dashboard that make it more user-friendly. They could also add support for multiple hypervisors."
"Lacks some integration and documentation could be improved."
"We need to be able to scale out and not just up. When you want to scale up or scale out, you are quite limited."
"Does not support the stretch cluster, and the interface is not good."
"The solution could improve by having more customization."
"If we compare it with VMware, the VMware product is basically very open, and it can be easily integrated with any platform. VMware product is also available on the cloud and is not an appliance-based product, whereas Cisco HyperFlex is an appliance-based product. Companies that want to use HCI as a platform or as a service would prefer something without an appliance. A SaaS-based product is better for a customer who is using the cloud and has multiple resources, workflows, and devices on the cloud and wants to go for a hyper-converged solution. This is where improvement is needed. In addition to an appliance-based product, Cisco should provide a SaaS-based product. Its price should be lower. Cisco needs to work on the pricing model for this product. Its price is a big road blocker when competing against Nutanix and VMware, which are its main competitors."
"One thing to keep in mind is that only experts can use it. It has to be in the proper hands, instead of going to XYZ people just for some cost savings. So lift-and-shift and migrations might be tricky, because it is not like a VMware."
"The price could be lower."
"We would like to see a cloud version of Acropolis AOS. Currently, we're trying to implement an AWS environment for some solutions, but we would like to use another technology also to enhance our organization, so we are looking for another technology for this, especially a cloud solution."
"Nutanix could streamline Acropolis' advanced management to keep pace with its competitors. For example, in VMware vSphere ESXi Hypervisor, you can directly put a host into maintenance mode via the GUI. However, it takes several steps to do this with Nutanix Acropolis, and you need to use the command-line interface for most of the steps."
"To have internal stability, we needed to network the solution ourselves. Performance depends on the application. Performance could be the lack of IOPS, memory and CPU and configuration issues."
"One disadvantage of Nutanix Acropolis AOS is it doesn't support external storage. Connecting external SAN storage to Nutanix, it's not supported."
"In Thailand, there really isn't a cloud version of Nutanx available to us."
"Nutanix needs to improve network features like Passthrough – SR-IOV. It could be improved by supporting SR-IOV, if they had that support, I would not have needed to implement the VMWare vSAN."
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Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series is ranked 8th in HCI with 29 reviews while Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) is ranked 1st in HCI with 74 reviews. Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series is rated 7.8, while Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) is rated 8.6. The top reviewer of Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series writes "High performance solution that makes it easy to efficiently manage VM resources". On the other hand, the top reviewer of Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) writes "Serious reliability and stability across the entire system makes for ROI". Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series is most compared with VxRail, VMware vSAN, HPE SimpliVity, Dell PowerFlex and FlexPod, whereas Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) is most compared with VxRail, VMware vSAN, HPE SimpliVity, VMware vSphere and Sangfor HCI. See our Cisco HyperFlex HX-Series vs. Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) report.
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With Nutanix you have the freedom of choice. You can deploy it with several server hardware vendors or completely in the cloud.
I don’t know Hyperflex at heart, though.
Also, support at Nutanix is outstanding.
Cisco HyperFlex HS series vs Nutanix Acropolis AOS
Cisco HyperFlex gives extended hyper-convergence functions from core to edge and multi-cloud environments. It helps IT and OT teams deploy hyper-converged infrastructure at scale. We looked into it but then ultimately chose Nutanix Acropolis.
We liked Hyperflex’s virtualization feature and the unified network fabric it provides. The Integrated Managed Controller was a nice feature to have. It is expandable, stable, and has good redundancy. If you require more processor cores per box, Cisco HyperFlex is a good solution for you. Support will depend on the type of contract you have, with some requests taken care of immediately and others taking longer according to the engineer’s expertise.
While Hyperflex is designed for any company size, I wouldn’t recommend them for small businesses. It also requires a solid knowledge of Cisco products, as the UI can be difficult to manage. Upgrading to a newer version can also be cumbersome and could use some improvement.
We chose Nutanix because it is easier to use and is more cost-effective. Nutanix allows us to deploy, run and scale applications both on-premises and in the cloud. It has excellent support. You can log the query straight to a technical expert, which is good if you have staff not familiar with AOS. It is easy to scale by adding new nodes, and the company is constantly adding new features.
Nutanix is not for everyone, though. The Nutanix Cloud System can be complex to maneuver when at the command line or when troubleshooting.
Conclusions
Nutanix is better for medium-sized companies and when you need a cost-effective solution. Cisco Hyperflex is a complete solution but is better suited for large enterprises. It works better if you are already a Cisco user.