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Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) vs Rackspace OpenStack comparison

 

Comparison Buyer's Guide

Executive Summary

Review summaries and opinions

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Categories and Ranking

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructur...
Average Rating
8.6
Reviews Sentiment
7.3
Number of Reviews
200
Ranking in other categories
Software Defined Storage (SDS) (5th), HCI (2nd), Software Defined Data Center (SDDC) (1st), Hybrid Cloud Computing Platforms (5th)
Rackspace OpenStack
Average Rating
8.0
Reviews Sentiment
5.0
Number of Reviews
18
Ranking in other categories
Converged Infrastructure (3rd)
 

Mindshare comparison

While both are Storage Solutions solutions, they serve different purposes. Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) is designed for HCI and holds a mindshare of 9.0%, up 9.1% compared to last year.
Rackspace OpenStack, on the other hand, focuses on Converged Infrastructure, holds 7.5% mindshare, up 4.7% since last year.
HCI Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)9.0%
VxRail10.1%
VMware vSAN8.1%
Other72.8%
HCI
Converged Infrastructure Mindshare Distribution
ProductMindshare (%)
Rackspace OpenStack7.5%
FlexPod XCS12.7%
HPE ConvergedSystem11.2%
Other68.6%
Converged Infrastructure
 

Featured Reviews

JD
Dsi at OFFICE PUBLIC DE L HABITAT DE ROUEN
Hyper-converged storage has improved performance and now supports high redundancy for our VMs
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) was transparent because we were on a regular infrastructure before. We went on NCI and were able to improve performance, but it did not really change how things worked. The performance was really better for applications and access times to the data. I regularly looked at the analytics to see what was going on in my servers and what it was saying to optimize performance. It was pretty interesting because it could analyze and give insights on how to get things working better. In the latest versions, the Prism interface has been replaced by Prism Central. This requires another machine to be deployed to manage the servers.
SS
Manager Dev Ops at MSD
Private cloud control has deepened my DevOps automation and strengthened security practices
For improvement, I feel the documentation available for setting up and creating infrastructure using Rackspace OpenStack could be enhanced, as I personally find the existing documents are not sufficient for new learners or beginners. We can also work on improving the user interface; the Horizon dashboard is functional, but compared to AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud, the UI feels somewhat dated. A more modern, intuitive interface with better navigation would enhance the overall user experience, especially for new users. Improving the documentation, including more real-world deployment examples, troubleshooting guides, and architecture best practices, would make onboarding much easier. Faster upgrades would also help; Rackspace OpenStack upgrades can sometimes be complex, so simplifying the upgrade process and minimizing downtime would assist organizations in maintaining their environments more easily. Additionally, improving monitoring capabilities would be beneficial, with advanced monitoring and analytics dashboards providing administrators deeper visibility into performance, capacity, and potential issues without relying heavily on third-party tools. Adding more managed services, similar to what public cloud providers offer, could reduce operational overhead while still allowing customers to retain the flexibility of a private cloud. Lastly, integrating AI could be valuable, with AI-driven recommendations for capacity planning, security monitoring, and automated troubleshooting improving platform management.

Quotes from Members

We asked business professionals to review the solutions they use. Here are some excerpts of what they said:
 

Pros

"Its most valuable feature is simplicity. It is so easy to use. Upgrades are easy. It is easy in terms of disaster recovery, failover, database provisioning, and reporting. Everything about it is just simple."
"Switching to Nutanix flipped the value proposition around, and suddenly one technical person qualified in Nutanix was all that was needed."
"Scaling is very easy and no limitations are set."
"Each performance test with SQL, Exchange, Oracle, or SAP is better than on a three-tier architecture."
"If you are looking for flexibility, space-saving, power-saving, and the best ROI, this is the solution to use."
"We increased stability and availability to 99.999%, and increased performance on our software platforms and databases drastically."
"Short answer: Ease of use, fast deployment, linear scaling of performance with capacity and richness of product features."
"In the world of IT operations, there is a lot of noise. Traditionally, systems would generate a great deal of alerts, events, and notifications, often leading to the operator either a) not seeing critical alerts since they are lost in the noise or b) disregarding the alerts/events."
"The open-source nature of OpenStack provides significant value."
"There are many services that can be directly used which are not available in VMware."
"I like its integration with GitLab and its simplicity. OpenStack has a lot of third-party libraries that it uses."
"In my experience, Rackspace OpenStack delivered a stable, flexible, and reliable private cloud environment."
"Rackspace OpenStack has positively impacted my organization by bringing us much closer to our customers based on the supportability this platform provides, and it has unique features which are very useful for our customers."
"Apart from the main features, I really appreciate OpenStack's microservices architecture and its flexibility for deployment with different tools."
"The most useful opinion about Rackspace OpenStack is that it is very flexible, first of all, and the most important feature is that it is feature-rich."
"The initial setup isn't too difficult."
 

Cons

"USB dongle-based licenses do not allow us to directly locate the USB ports on Nutanix."
"Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure can be improved in terms of the sizing of the solution."
"The product needs improvement in the areas of SAN attachment for high capacity and high I/O profile workloads."
"In the next release of this solution, they could improve by being more competitive with VMware. I would like all third-party solutions to work well with Nutanix Acropolis AOS."
"The software-defined networking should be improved. It is quite substandard as compared to the VMware variant. The software-defined networking is quite limited, and we usually use other products to do that. We're aware that Nutanix is working on that and will be coming out with better solutions, and we can't wait because to do a fully software-defined architecture, the abstraction layer needs not only software-defined storage, which you have, but also the software-defined networking piece."
"The biggest thing that I've seen has been the backup and recovery which has been challenging for them over the past couple of years."
"In Thailand, there really isn't a cloud version of Nutanx available to us."
"For these types of workloads, we realized the solution doesn’t seem to fit well, leaving many of the requests either being dropped or transmission lost."
"It could use more examples in different languages (API use cases).​"
"OpenStack's UI, while user-friendly, could be improved to offer a more intuitive experience."
"I cannot comment comprehensively on how Rackspace OpenStack can be improved, as I do not find that much difference; however, some areas can be improved, such as support for OEMs deploying highly specialized real-time telecom and media workloads."
"So for the main stability, there have been a couple of issues that I've experienced."
"VMware has a side-to-side replication feature, which is still more mature than Rackspace OpenStack's which can't be used in a production environment."
"For improvement, I feel the documentation available for setting up and creating infrastructure using Rackspace OpenStack could be enhanced, as I personally find the existing documents are not sufficient for new learners or beginners."
"In terms of what needs to be improved, I would say the support. Rackspace might have some good support but the open source OpenStack doesn't have support because there are too many versions coming and too many people are customizing it."
"The pricing for Rackspace OpenStack is sometimes not competitive according to other market products, as sometimes the price is high for some components like Advanced Cluster Management (ACM) and Advanced Cluster Security, which are very costly add-ons, not the main license."
 

Pricing and Cost Advice

"I would rate the price seven out of ten with ten being the most expensive."
"Its price is fine. I can't really complain about that."
"I think it's cheaper than VMware in terms of cost."
"They offer multiple tier licensing which means that lower level licensing will have less features."
"There is a license required for this solution and my clients usually purchase a two-year license with extended support. The price of the solution could be reduced, it is more expensive than competitors."
"The initial cost is affordable but the renewal fees are high."
"We are aware of the pricing since we renew every year, at almost $100,000 per year."
"The price of the license for Nutanix Acropolis AOS is less expensive than the competition. There is a favorable cost saving. Having only the need to deal with a single vendor, the management of the customer's entire stack is cost-effective."
"The pricing is low."
"I use it as an open-source tool."
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Comparison Review

it_user244362 - PeerSpot reviewer
Managing Consultant with 51-200 employees
Aug 30, 2015
Nutanix vs. VMware EVO:RAIL vs. FlexPod
Originally posted at www.storagegaga.com/dont-get-too-drunk-on-hyper-converged/ I hate the fact that I am bursting the big bubble brewing about Hyper Convergence (HC). I urge all to look past the hot air and hype frenzy that are going on, because in the end, the HC platforms have to be aligned…
 

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews
Computer Software Company
10%
Manufacturing Company
9%
Financial Services Firm
8%
Outsourcing Company
7%
Financial Services Firm
15%
Computer Software Company
12%
Manufacturing Company
11%
Comms Service Provider
7%
 

Company Size

By reviewers
Large Enterprise
Midsize Enterprise
Small Business
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business93
Midsize Enterprise76
Large Enterprise88
By reviewers
Company SizeCount
Small Business9
Midsize Enterprise5
Large Enterprise8
 

Questions from the Community

How do I choose between Cisco Hyperflex HX Series and Nutanix Acropolis AOS?
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...
What makes Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) worth using?
NCI is a product with many tools and services but the one that, in my opinion, makes it better than similar products and worth using, is the full-stack lifecycle management. This capacity allows u...
Have you received reliable help from Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure's support when you contacted them?
NCI is one of the best out there. For any software, no matter how good it is, technical support makes it or breaks it for me. You may have an amazing product but if there is not anyone to help you ...
What needs improvement with Rackspace OpenStack?
Rackspace OpenStack can be improved because it wasn't clear that you have to cancel 30 days before; otherwise they charge you for the month. I didn't really feel there was anywhere I could go if I ...
What is your primary use case for Rackspace OpenStack?
My main use case for Rackspace OpenStack was for storage, such as cloud drive storage for all the photography and paperwork that we have for the association, and then I also had multiple email addr...
What advice do you have for others considering Rackspace OpenStack?
The accessibility of Rackspace OpenStack was kind of hard to add to iPhone; many of the board members had issues with it when adding it to their cell phones. The way you would add the mail server h...
 

Also Known As

Nutanix Acropolis AOS, Nutanix AOS, Nutanix Acropolis
OpenStack
 

Overview

 

Sample Customers

St. Lukes Health System, the City of Seattle, Yahoo! Japan, Sligro, Empire Life, Hyundai AUS, and many others.
X.commerce
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