Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) vs Scale Computing Platform comparison

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) vs. Scale Computing Platform

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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...

Ranking in HCI

5th

Average Rating

8.6

Reviews Sentiment

7.3

Number of Reviews

199

Ranking in other categories

Software Defined Storage (SDS) (6th), Software Defined Data Center (SDDC) (1st), Hybrid Cloud Computing Platforms (4th)

Scale Computing Platform

Ranking in HCI

16th

Average Rating

8.0

Reviews Sentiment

7.5

Number of Reviews

Ranking in other categories

Edge Computing Platforms (1st)

Mindshare comparison

As of December 2025, in the HCI category, the mindshare of Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) is 9.2%, up from 8.1% compared to the previous year. The mindshare of Scale Computing Platform is 2.2%, up from 1.3% compared to the previous year. It is calculated based on PeerSpot user engagement data.

HCI Market Share Distribution
Product	Market Share (%)
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)	9.2%
Scale Computing Platform	2.2%
Other	88.6%

HCI

Featured Reviews

Obasanjo Biliaminu

Head Systems Administration/Security at Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System PLC

Infrastructure efficiency has improved significantly with quick server provisioning, though physical to virtual migrations need a streamlined in-house tool

From my experience with Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI), there is one area that needs improvement. When moving a critical infrastructure from a physical machine to Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI), we currently have to use a third-party tool to convert the physical machine to a VM. We have to use VMware converter to perform this conversion before moving it to Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI). I would suggest that Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) should develop their own P2V (physical to VM) tools instead of requiring users to rely on third-party solutions.

Read full review

AbdulSattar

Channel Sales Manager at Softech Microsystems

Extremely easy to learn and use for beginners

Some features go well with other tools like VMware, where making something on the fly or making some changes on the fly in the area of memory or something is possible. On the fly, you cannot do anything on Scale Computing HC3, though it is a very rarely needed area. Being able to make some changes on the fly is very risky, but even then, you see customers saying since it is an area that is not possible with Scale Computing HC3, it is better to go with some other tools. My company convinces our customers that opting for another solution is not required since a tool that allows us to make some changes on the fly can be very risky, and it is also not something that fits in according to certain policies or good practices.

Read full review

Quotes from Members

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

Pros

"Hyper-convergence is the most valuable feature for me as it allows me to scale the hardware according to project requirements."

"The solution is easy to use and the pricing is affordable."

"Acropolis AOS is scalable to nodes and the cloud."

"Their Google operating system is more mature, so their results are much better."

"Great flexibility and scalability."

"The most valuable features of Nutanix Acropolis AOS are storage and hyper-converged. The solution is easy to use and the administration is very good."

"It has solid performance and provides data locality."

"The architecture of Nutanix is the best, and the virtualization we get, out of the box, is an advantage. Also, dedupe and compression are done natively, inside the platform, so there are no additional licenses. That adds value to it."

More Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) pros

"It gives the ease of management for a small IT department."

"I like that Scale Computing HCR is slimmed down and gives me the features I need and not features that I don't need."

"The most valuable features are the appliance-type feel and that you don't need additional licenses as everything is built-in."

"The product's initial setup phase is too easy."

"I rate Scale Computing support 10 out of 10. They're accessible and responsive."

"The most valuable feature of Scale Computing HC3 is if one of the devices fails, you won't even notice, the service maintains operation. The customers don't have to waste two, or three days on delays. Additionally, you do not have to waste time with recovery software, it is a lot easier."

"The solution is scalable."

"The initial setup is pretty straightforward."

More Scale Computing Platform pros

Cons

"The process of migrating from old hardware to new could improve."

"As far as what could be improved, they have some built-in backup functions already, but any built-in isolation features like vision security features and free LAN features become a security concern."

"USB dongle-based licenses do not allow us to directly locate the USB ports on Nutanix."

"The solution has more features than required"

"The product needs improvement in the areas of SAN attachment for high capacity and high I/O profile workloads."

"It would be great if it could emulate some of the features that their competitor VMware has, for example port mirroring or Netflow output at hypervisor level."

"As of now, Acropolis and VMware cannot talk to each other. Until we have some kind of interface, it would be much better for Nutanix if they built an interface which can talk. Otherwise, if I have a VMware stack and I already have a Nutanix stack, I create containers, I create clusters on VMware, I create clusters on Nutanix. All of these clusters cannot talk to each other. Then it has to be then subverted as a parallel execution. What happens then is that I have to work in two different environments within my data center. Practically, they are two different data centers but physically and logically, they are one. If they cannot talk to each other that creates a lot of issues. That is something which Nutanix has to develop because for Nutanix it is very simple. For example, Oracle is using a function called GoldenGate. They have a feature called GoldenGate which allows them to talk to various different environments which must really help."

"Nutanix Acropolis AOS could improve by having an auto-update feature. At this time I have to update each system manually. However, I bought the standard license and I did not buy the maximum license they have available. There could be a certain license that does the updates automatically."

More Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) cons

"Scale Computing HC3 said in an announcement they were going to integrate with a backup service which would be good. If they could do this it would be beneficial."

"I've had so many issues with the sales team when I was looking to make some improvements, and improve the performance. They would create so many excuses to force me to buy new nodes all the time and not let me add more memory to each node."

"Scale HC3 improvements would involve literally fixing up the replication."

"On the fly, you cannot do anything on Scale Computing HC3, though it is a very rarely needed area."

"I would like bigger clusters with more than eight nodes."

"There could be an easier way to see which servers are on each node"

"The snapshot technology takes up 500 times more space compared to other solutions."

"The product struggles to cope with bigger workloads. In the next release, I'd like some backup solutions to be added."

More Scale Computing Platform cons

Pricing and Cost Advice

"If a customer has been using VMware, the difference in pricing is lower. However, if they are looking to use the VMware, the price can be much higher depending on the license."

"It is not cheap, but if you look at the return on investment and the total cost of ownership, it is worth the price."

"The price of the solution is high."

"Nutanix price is high because it bundles all the components into single deals rather than allowing you to select the features that you want/will use."

"In terms of the solution's licensing, it's quite comprehensive."

"Nutanix Acropolis AOS is affordable, it has good value. The final price depends a lot on the hardware used, it's an appliance in the end. Whether you use HPE as the hardware vendor or Supermicro as the hardware vendor, it really depends on what hardware is used which is the main cost."

"We have a three-year license for the use of this solution."

"I know Nutanix and VxRail have similar prices and licenses. Nutanix is a go-ahead if AHV is used as hypervisor because it is already embedded in the price."

More Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) pricing and cost advice

"I pay for Scale Computing HC3 and it includes customer service for one year. We paid for an additional year for customer service but that includes the updates and everything for the software. Additionally, the licensing is for Windows, which is the same for everybody."

"I give the pricing a nine out of ten."

"The product is worth the money, but I would not say it's very cheap or very expensive."

"rate HC3's pricing a five out of ten since it is affordable."

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Comparison Review

it_user244362

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…

Read full review

Top Industries

By visitors reading reviews

Computer Software Company

15%

Manufacturing Company

Government

Financial Services Firm

Manufacturing Company

14%

Computer Software Company

12%

Government

Wholesaler/Distributor

Company Size

By reviewers

Large Enterprise

Midsize Enterprise

Small Business

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	91
Midsize Enterprise	77
Large Enterprise	82

By reviewers
Company Size	Count
Small Business	5
Midsize Enterprise	3
Large Enterprise	1

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 do you like most about Scale Computing HC3?

The product's initial setup phase is too easy.

What is your experience regarding pricing and costs for Scale Computing HC3?

It fit our budget, so it was great.

What needs improvement with Scale Computing HC3?

There could be an easier way to see which servers are on each node. It shows you a small graphical interface, but you have to see them all, and you have to really struggle to figure out which nodes...

VxRail vs Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)

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Compared 12% of the time

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Compared 7% of the time

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More Scale Computing Platform Competitors

Product Reports

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI)

Download Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) product report

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) report

HCI

Download Scale Computing Platform product report

Also Known As

Nutanix Acropolis AOS, Nutanix AOS, Nutanix Acropolis

Scale Computing HC3

Overview

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) is a top-ranking HCI software, cloud management tool, and Software Defined Storage (SDS) tool that is marketed as the foundation for users' hybrid clouds. It offers a powerful and secure hyperconverged infrastructure to deliver all data and applications at any scale and on any cloud. The solution offers a complete software stack that allows users to unify their hybrid cloud infrastructure.

NCI’s services include computer, storage and network, hypervisors and containers, and deployment in public or in private clouds. The product also comes with built-in resilience, disaster recovery capabilities, self-healing, and high-security capacities. It provides further deployment flexibility through several software and hardware options and platforms. NCI includes a full set of enterprise capabilities. It can also be deployed on a wide range of servers from popular manufacturers.

The capabilities of the product are categorized into three main groups:

AOS storage
Flexible and open compute
Automated and secure networking

Outside of these categories, NCI also offers other capabilities:

Integrated disaster recovery
Full-stack lifecycle management
VMware with Nutanix
Intelligent operations

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) Features

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) offers its customers various features and tools in each of the previously mentioned categories. The available features for users currently include:

High-performance: This set of features utilizes hardware advances such as NVMe and RDMA to accelerate users' most demanding applications with consistent performance. The tools in this feature category work alongside data locality to ensure successful results.
Foolproof resiliency: These Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure features protect data and keep it available by facilitating advanced distributed consistency algorithms. Users can utilize these features to protect their data from issues like bit rot, hardware failures, and even entire site failure.
Flexibility: This set of features allows storage to be sized for the needs of each organization and expanded promptly and easily so that the organization and its data can grow. The features offer flexibility to users in terms of applying storage policies logically on a pre-workload basis, instead of being tied to hardware.
Hypervisor choice: Users can choose from the leading hypervisors - Microsoft Hyper-V or VMware ESXi. They can also leverage the built-in hypervisor AHV that Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) provides.
Integrated virtualization: These features offer simplified automation and AHV streamlined operations. The services in this category are optimized for high performance and reliability.
Kubernetes: Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) offers features to build and deploy cloud-native applications on intelligent distributed infrastructure. Apps can be integrated with cloud-compatible storage and both building and deployment can be achieved within the same platform.
Microsegmentation: Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) offers features to prevent malware spread and reduce attack surfaces by leveraging machine learning (ML).
Virtual networking: This set of features allows users to easily implement multi-tenancy in their environment or stretch networks across clouds.
Centralized network management: Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) provides organizations with a way to manage networking configurations centrally. Users can utilize it across their human-computer interaction (HCI) environment with simple virtual switch management.

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) Benefits

The product offers various benefits to users who utilize its capacities. Some of these include:

NCI reduces technology sprawl and frees up technical resources to allow organizations to focus on other activities, potentially reducing costs for the business.
The product allows customers to deploy, scale, and bridge to the public cloud to be able to react in evolving business environments.
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure improves data availability while simultaneously protecting it against several kinds of failures and attacks.
The solution offers high-performance, resilient distributed storage for all workloads.
Working alongside Nutanix Cloud Platform, NCI offers simple management of data from one console.
Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure works by the zero trust philosophy, protecting users' apps and data through specially designed security protocols.

Reviews from Real Users

According to Gerhard J., an IT manager at Q4 Fuel, Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) provides serious reliability and stability across the entire system makes for ROI.

A solutions architect at a computer software company describes NCI as a stable, straightforward to set up, and scalable solution.

Nutanix

Scale Computing Platform is renowned for swift setup, stability, and performance. It provides a seamless user experience with integrated licenses and efficient management, catering to small IT departments.

Scale Computing Platform offers a user-friendly GUI and delivers superior performance with exceptional read/write speeds, outperforming competitors like Nutanix. It eliminates the need for additional recovery software and simplifies licensing. Users note its simplicity and efficiency over VMware, Nutanix, and HPE SimpliVity. However, there is a need for improved support, better upgrade processes, and more integration with external backup services. The platform faces challenges with larger workloads, with snapshot technology requiring optimization. Enhancements are needed in dashboard usability and node visibility, and users seek flexibility for on-the-fly changes.

What are the key features of Scale Computing Platform?

Ease of Setup: Simplifies installation, making it accessible for small IT teams.
Fast Performance: Provides superior read/write speeds compared to others.
Built-In Licenses: Integrates necessary licenses, reducing complexity.
User-Friendly GUI: Facilitates efficient management for IT departments.
Scalability: Adapts easily to growing business needs without hassle.

What benefits or ROI should users anticipate?

Stability: Ensures reliable system performance for continuous operations.
Cost Efficiency: Reduces need for additional software, offering a cost-effective solution.
Resource Management: Enhances prioritization and management of virtual machines.
User Satisfaction: Provides an appliance-like experience with minimal hassles.

Implementing Scale Computing Platform in industries supports virtualization needs for organizations operating with fewer than thirty VMs. It's commonly used for hosting internal servers, executing POCs, and running applications like SAGE Computer and QuickBooks. The platform aids businesses in creating private clouds, supporting efficient resource management and enhancing server operations, particularly with Acronis Backup.

Scale Computing

Sample Customers

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

Resorts World Las Vegas, Stena, Telford Offshore, Goodwill, Sandals, Jerry's Enterprises, Mendard's Royal Farms, Delhaize, Benchmark Electronics, Classic Hotels, Genting Casino, Lindt, Sainsbury's, Landmark Cinemas, Golden Queen Mining, Coca Cola. Holiday Inn, Iron County School District, Sevier County Bank, City of St. Cloud Minnesota, Presbyterian Mo-Ranch Assembly, KIB Electronics, Brake Masters, Lincoln County Hospital, Ohio Summit County Board of Elections

Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure (NCI) vs. Scale Computing Platform