The Nutanix Solution

Virtualized desktops and applications

Nutanix’s turnkey infrastructure adds virtual desktops and virtual applications to any device, including tablets and smartphones. The Nutanix Virtual Computing Platform is a plug-and-play appliance that comes ready to run VMware View, Citrix XenDesktop, and XenApp.

It radically simplifies virtualization projects at a fraction of the cost. By integrating server (compute) resources with enterprise-class storage, Nutanix delivers a single-box solution that powers a full VDI environment. And, it’s deployable in 30 minutes or less.

The Nutanix architecture enables a single cluster to scale easily to meet the needs of almost any size business. You can start with 50 to 100 users for a limited VDI rollout, and later ramp up to tens of thousands of users within the same environment.

The Nutanix platform supports any existing virtual desktop or end-user computing scenario. Whether you have persistent desktops that are customized for knowledge workers or shared hosted virtual desktops (HVD) for a general workforce, Nutanix provides the right resources in a single-box solution.

Nutanix benefits

• Out-of-the-box deployment: Start provisioning VMware View or Citrix XenDesktop in less than 30 minutes, without specialized training. 
• Simple scale out: When your system needs to support more VDI users, you can add Nutanix nodes seamlessly and dynamically with no disruption to the production environment. 
• Lower costs: Dramatically lower VDI deployment costs by eliminating complex and costly storage area networks (SANs). 
• Single platform: All VDI services, including connection servers and session brokers, run adjacent to each other on the same Nutanix platform.
• Full VDI support: Nutanix supports advanced VDI functionality, including VMware features such as vStorage API for Array integration (VAAI). 
• Unparalled performance: A single 2U Nutanix appliance delivers enough performance and storage capacity to power up to 400 virtual desktops.
• Eliminate infrastructure over-provisioning: You don’t have to overprovision storage resources just to ensure top-notch VDI performance. Nutanix QuickClone functionality lets you rapidly provision virtual desktops as you need them.

Download the VMware View best practices PDF. 

Download the VMware View reference architecture PDF.

Download the VMware Horizon Suite on Nutanix reference architecture PDF.

Download the XenDesktop and vSphere reference architecture PDF.

Download the Nutanix VDI Sizing Guideline PDF.

Download the VDI solution brief PDF. 

Finding the right platform for Hadoop

The amount of data generated in businesses is growing exponentially. From business transactions and customer interactions to web-log tracking, data accumulates at an unrelenting pace. Turning that data into information and actionable insights is a challenge for traditional databases, which are generally hard to scale up to tera- or petabyte levels.

Hadoop addresses this “big data” challenge by delivering open-source software for reliable, scalable, distributed computing, and data processing. It provides a powerful software library that uses a simple programming model to enable distributed processing of large data sets across clusters of nodes. It scales up from a single node to thousands of nodes, each offering local computation and storage. 

The first question that most IT teams face when they implement Hadoop is whether to run the system on bare metal, or to virtualize the environment. The state-of-the-art converged architectures that are now available make a compelling argument for the benefits of virtualizing Hadoop installations.

The case for virtualizing Hadoop

• Superior hardware utilization: Bare-metal Hadoop deployments average only 10 to 20 percent CPU utilization, which wastes hardware resources and datacenter space. Virtualizing Hadoop uses the hardware far more effectively and provides more flexibility.
• Dynamic addition and removal of Hadoop nodes: Changes based on load allow you to scale according to your current needs, without having to anticipate future demands.
• Sandbox workloads: Hadoop installations can co-exist with enterprise applications in the same environment.
• Batch scheduling and stacked workloads: Hadoop jobs can run during off-peak hours, taking advantage of idle night and weekend hours. Or, VMware’s resource-pooling capabilities can run workloads concurrently.

Nutanix benefits

• Reduced footprint: Nutanix uses a hyper-scale server architecture that reduces Hadoop hardware footprints by up to 4x.
• Fast performance: You can process up to 2,000 MB/s of sequential throughput in a compact 2U appliance. (A TeraSort benchmark yields 250 MB/s in the same 2U form factor.) ILM ensures that data is localized for the lowest possible latency. Heat-optimized tiering (HOT) archives inactive or older data that is not heavily used and automatically moves it back up the tiers when the system detects more call for it.
• No single point of failure; high availability: NameNode in the Hadoop Distributed FileSystem is a single point of failure. Nutanix removes this failure potential with built-in high availability and replication features to secure all pieces of Hadoop data.
• Advanced change management: Nutanix maintains environmental control and separation between development, test, staging, and production environments.
• Capacity optimization: Nutanix snapshots and QuickClones help share production data with non-production jobs, without requiring full copies and unnecessary data duplication.
• Time-sliced clusters: Nutanix allows you to run your server and desktop virtualization service adjacent with Hadoop on a single converged cloud.
• Unified data platform: You can run multiple data-processing platforms simultaneously with Hadoop.

Download the Hadoop reference architecture PDF. 

Download the Hadoop solution brief.

Delivering virtualized infrastructure as a service

A private cloud offers the simplicity and flexibility of a public cloud within the confines of the enterprise datacenter. A hallmark of private-cloud environments is virtualization, which uses resources effectively and increases overall IT agility. 

Nutanix provides a scalable and modular building block for enterprise private clouds of any size. The Nutanix solution converges storage and server (compute) resources into a single appliance to run any type of virtual workload with the best performance. 

Nutanix benefits

• Pooled datacenter resources: As a next-generation converged platform, Nutanix delivers server resources, storage performance, and capacity on-demand. By pooling resources across all nodes and making them available in real time to any VM, Nutanix helps break down traditional datacenter silos. Nutanix next-gen convergence brings true elasticity to a private cloud infrastructure.
• Self-service: Private clouds must be able to quickly and easily provision new services. With Nutanix, development and test engineers working in a Nutanix private cloud can rapidly “spin up” new virtual machines with VM-dedicated storage resources using an intuitive management console. Nutanix streamlines the provisioning of new applications or workloads by reducing the manual coordination among groups that traditional datacenter operations require.
• Pay-as-you-grow scalability: You can add Nutanix appliances and individual nodes to existing clusters to increase capacity incrementally. That way, you can precisely meet business and datacenter demands. This modular scalability enables a truly agile and efficient virtual datacenter. It eliminates the need to overprovision simply to ensure necessary capacity and performance for the future.
• Virtualization-friendly: The Nutanix architecture is completely hypervisor agnostic, and can run multiple virtualization technologies simultaneously. This built-in flexibility allows you to avoid being locked into a single virtualization vendor, and provides the ability to run mixed workloads in a single private-cloud environment.

Download the private cloud solution brief.

Simplifying DR strategies

Implementing a disaster-recovery site can be complex, time-consuming, and expensive. A key challenge is predicting the amount of storage capacity that will satisfy the future needs of the organization. Another common obstacle is system upgrades: Many traditional DR deployments rely on rigid hardware-based architectures that are expensive and involve unnecessary downtime. 

When you plan a DR site, you need the right technologies to ensure seamless integration with existing systems to minimize costs, reduce deployment time, and eliminate downtime. You also need the simplicity of managing DR policies that are purpose-built for virtual environments.

Deploying the Nutanix all-in-one DR solution

Nutanix provides a complete DR solution for virtual datacenters. With integrated functionality from converged backups and recovery to remote site replication, Nutanix eliminates costly third-party tools. DR capabilities are engineered for easy VM management, and the solution includes built-in run-book automation. You can replicate data from any primary site to a Nutanix cluster to provide organizations with full DR capabilities.

Nutanix benefits

• Efficient VM-centric backup and recovery: The Nutanix platform delivers true VM-centric backup, recovery, and replication capabilities. Unlike traditional solutions that perform backups and recovery at the LUN-level, Nutanix provides DR functions at the VM and file level for efficiency and simplicity. VMs and data remain safe in a crash-consistent environment, giving you RPO flexibility. The Nutanix solution also operates at the sub-block level for the highest granularity and most efficient space savings.
• Flexibility of many-to-many replication: The Nutanix DR and replication solution gives the IT administrator ultimate flexibility. By allowing many-to-many replication, Nutanix breaks the bounds set by traditional site-to-site replication solutions. Administrator-dictated replication and recovery plans replace the constraints of legacy replication platforms. Sub-block-level change transfers enable the highest possible replication performance and efficiency and greatly reduce the load on the WAN and decreasing RTOs.
• Scalability with zero downtime: As a software-defined platform, Nutanix delivers new features and upgrades via software, with no disruption to operations. You don’t have to put up with hardware refresh cycles for feature enhancements.

Download the disaster recovery solution brief.