What is our primary use case?
We use the solution more for Citrix profile VDI. We also have some Windows servers running, and we use Nutanix Unified Storage more for the server platform. If I remember correctly, we have more than 1,200 servers running on the Nutanix cluster.
How has it helped my organization?
Our company is a product-based company that performs order processing. Most of our applications are on the web. We also get invoices and a lot of files. It generates a lot of files and keeps them on the server, and the application is posted on some of Nutanix's servers as well.
In my experience, we haven't had any outages so far. The virtualization of the memory is based on the usage, and it consumes a lot. The previous tools were not as efficient as compared to Nutanix Unified Storage.
What is most valuable?
Nutanix Unified Storage is a cluster. Compared to any other virtualization environment, Nutanix Unified Storage doesn't require any downtime to upgrade and doesn't experience storage outages. So, things are going smoothly with Nutanix, and that's the best part of the Nutanix cluster for storage.
The solution's most valuable feature is the Prism Central centralized management console. We have close to eight to nine clusters and also remote sites. Compared to other tools, the solution is easy to manage. I would also like to mention the solution's ActiveDR concept and replication.
We have sites from different locations, and we are in the process of procuring ultimate licensing. Even if one cluster goes down, we can bring it up and have the application operating from the other site. That's the beauty of the tool, which makes it more efficient.
We use Cohesity from Nutanix to protect our organization's unstructured data. We also have a cloud-based Rubrik tool. Cohesity has the same infrastructure as Nutanix Unified Storage. I am an administrator for both Nutanix Unified Storage and Cohesity. We take snapshot-level backups. Since we are implementing ultimate licensing for remote sites, we will use an internal snapshot feature to replicate to the other sites.
The solution's storage and scalability features have improved our data operations. Our storage is increasing daily for business purposes. Nutanix Unified Storage has good scalability. We recently received some orders, and some nodes were added.
I like Nutanix's data locality feature because it improved our data accessibility and availability.
Implementing Nutanix Unified Storage has tremendously reduced the number of storage nodes by around 20% to 30%.
What needs improvement?
There is no tagging concept in Nutanix Unified Storage where you can tag the servers. It is more useful for backups because I manage backups as well. In other solutions, you can group servers in the backup. Although we can do a complete cluster of VMs in Nutanix, we cannot tag the server to a particular tag ID or number you can pull from the backup solutions.
If you call for that number, the server should ideally take the backups irrespective of the cluster in which it is present. We faced issues with those things. We have to protect the entire cluster manually. The server tagging feature could be added to the solution's future releases.
We didn't face any issues in Nutanix after the upgrade, but we had issues with the Cohesity backups. We consistently work with both the vendors, and that has been fixed. So that is the only thing that we had faced up to the upgrade.
For how long have I used the solution?
We have been using the solution in my current organization for four years, and I used it for over a year in my previous organization. So, I have a total of five years of experience with Nutanix Unified Storage.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Nutanix Unified Storage is a stable solution. That's what we need. I see. As a customer, we look for such solutions to stabilize our environment and storage. Our day-to-day business requires that.
I rate the solution’s stability a nine out of ten.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
Around 784 users use the solution in our organization.
I rate the solution’s scalability ten out of ten.
How are customer service and support?
The solution's technical support is good and pretty responsive. We contact the support for small issues, and their problem-solving is the highest.
I rate the solution’s technical support a nine or ten out of ten.
How would you rate customer service and support?
How was the initial setup?
The solution's initial setup is straightforward. The upgrade from a previous version to the latest version is also easy. I wasn't involved in the solution's initial setup because it already existed when I joined the company. However, I was involved in increasing the nodes, which took around three to four hours. I don't remember exactly because it's been a while since we added storage.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
From what I hear from the management, Nutanix Unified Storage has comparatively decent pricing. I think we are in pro licensing and have yet to get ultimate licensing.
What other advice do I have?
We are not into AI yet. I'm an administrator and not an authorized personnel for those things. We are a product-based electronic components reseller. From what I have heard from management, we will be implementing AI soon.
We are mostly concerned about and focused on security hardening. Some internal solutions, like SentinelOne, have been recommended for security hardening. However, we are not dedicatedly using anything. We are also checking Cohesity DataHawk, and we are still in the process of finalizing it.
The solution is deployed in eight locations. We have multiple nodes in our main data center and DR data center. We mainly use the solution for VDI profiles and server virtualization.
I told my old colleagues that we are using Nutanix Unified Storage, and they were pretty impressed with its features. I would recommend Nutanix Unified Storage to users as a unified storage solution.
Overall, I rate the solution a nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
On-premises
*Disclosure: PeerSpot contacted the reviewer to collect the review and to validate authenticity. The reviewer was referred by the vendor, but the review is not subject to editing or approval by the vendor.