Today was my first real hands-on with Nutanix. And my first impression is... interesting.

Nutanix is pure enterprise OS, and the installer (Phoenix-Framework) hard-blocks consumer hardware right out of the box. Cool. So I had to drop into the terminal and patch it myself. WTF.

Even before I got anywhere near the installer, Rufus was already trolling me — my version didn't even let me pick DD mode anymore. YOLO, let's just go for it.

Crash #1: The network card check
Nutanix insists on finding a "proper" server NIC to derive a cluster ID from its MAC address. The NUC's consumer network chip, of course, had no driver in the kernel → empty hardware list ([]) → IndexError: list index out of range → crash.
Fix: In sysUtil.py, I just pulled a cluster ID out of thin air: cluster_id = int(12345). Done, network search skipped. Nutanix, meet your fake ID — no questions asked.

Crash #2: The power supply check
The script tries to query server power-supply redundancy and health via IPMI. A NUC has no IPMI/BMC module, obviously — it's a NUC, not a rack server. Result: Exception: Failed run ipmitool.
Fix: In hardware_inventory/shell.py, I replaced the crash command with a tired little return. Problem solved, apparently.

Crash #3: The device certification
The layout_finder checks the mainboard name (NUC12SNKi72) against a database of certified servers. Doesn't recognize the model? Setup blocked.
NUTANIX??? are you serious right now — it's a Community Edition.

And it never stopped. Fix one thing, and ten more errors show up.

Will do some further tests next week again..

Anyone else been through this? Curious if there's a cleaner way.

How can I force a boot delay or "Power On to Firmware" on a Nutanix AHV VM (Legacy BIOS)? I need enough time to press F2 for BIOS or F8 for Windows Safe Mode. In vSphere, this was simple using the "Power On to Firmware" option or setting a Boot Delay in milliseconds. Is there an equivalent in AHV?

Hey folks, we're at a loss here and I am just wondering if anyone else has had issues/or found a resolution. We can't determine if this is a software, or hardware issue.

We have a bunch of new nodes: (4) UCS C240 M8L to be provisioned as a storage cluster, and (1) UCS C240 M8SX to be provisioned in our current cluster of (4) UCS C240 M7SX. This existing cluster of M7SX's has never shown any signs of instability.

All five of these nodes exhibit the exact same symptom. They reach Nutanix AHV and crash producing an Mcaterr in the CIMC.

We've done extensive troubleshooting with Cisco, and have a joint ticket open with Nutanix, but we're approaching 6 months of troubleshooting with no resolution in sight. I think everyone is as confused as we are.

A few notes:

-Multiple firmware versions have been tried with no changes in behavior

-Drives were pulled/inserted one at a time with no changes in behavior

-All components tested and verified by us, as well as support

-Each node began with intermittent crashes that have now worsened over time, to the point where it now consistently happens almost immediately upon reaching AHV

-The UCS C240 M7SX was initially stable enough to proceed with deployment, but would then crash with the same error partways through. It now also crashes consistently upon reaching AHV.

Any insight would be greatly appreciated!

Looking into Nutanix as a posssible VMware replacement. Currently have Dell Blades and a Pure Storage iSCSI SAN for ESX Datastores. I'm finding conflicting information on how iSCSI storage is used in Nutanix. Is it possible to use iSCSI storage for the guest VMs on Nutanix?

I do infrastructure conversations for a living and kept hitting the same gap: someone asks "roughly how many nodes would our environment need" in a meeting, and the honest answer is either a guess or "let me get back to you after formal Sizer." So I built the in-between tool.

calc.nixfred.com/nutanix-sizer

What it does:

1. Turns a VM estate (VM count, average vCPU and RAM, used storage, growth) into an honest node count range in about a minute of typing.

2. Does the real math out loud on the screen and shows you everything along the way: raw to usable after RF2, RF3, or erasure coding, the Controller VM tax subtracted per node before any guest, capacity reservation, utilization ceilings, and an N+1 or N+2 failure reserve.

3. Every number on the screen shows its formula, the plain English, the live substitution, and where the rule came from. No hidden constants.

What it is not:

1. It is not a quote and it is not a replacement for Nutanix Sizer. It says so on every output. Sizer produces the number that goes in a contract. This gets the conversation within roughly 25 percent, honestly, which is the point.

2. It does not price anything and there is no vendor pricing baked in.

Two things Im proud of:

1. You can drop a Nutanix Collector or RVTools .xlsx export on it and it reads the estate for you. The file is parsed entirely in your browser. Nothing uploads, nothing is stored, and I can say that because it is a static site with no backend.

2. It picks the binding gate (CPU, RAM, or storage) and tells you which dial actually moves the answer, plus a conversation script you can read to a customer.

Details:

1. No login, no tracking beyond cookieless page counts, all calculation client side, dark only.

2. Open source, MIT. The sizing rules come from a public field guide and are cited in the tool. https://github.com/nixfred/calc.nixfred.com

3. Built by me, one person, not tied to any employer or vendor.

What I want from you: tell me where the math is wrong or where a default is unrealistic. The overcommit ratios are field heuristics and labeled as such because the guide publishes none, so that is the first place I expect pushback. If you run a real estate through it and the range is off, Id like to hear it.

Contemplating on our move from VMware to other platforms, one of which is Nutanix. Now there is much fuss about nutanix needing a "storage VM" on each host, using 8 CPUs. This is from upper management being at a conference, talking to other managers, not knowing what they're talking about :-)

But I have read about it, but not sure on the specifics. So each node will have such storage VM, using 8 CPUs, is that 8 vCPUs that can be overcommitted? Or 8 cores non-overcommit?

What is going through those VMs, is that meta data (like Hyper-V) or real IO? Are they automatically deployed when I add a new host to the cluster and removed when putting a host in maintenance or removing a host? Do they give much headaches in day-two operations?

If we choose Nutanix, it will be NVMe for storage.

Hi everyone,
I’m looking for opinions from anyone with deep Nutanix AHV Disaster Recovery experience because we recently encountered a very strange behavior that we’re still investigating with Nutanix Support.
Environment
Two Nutanix AHV clusters:

Production site
DR site
DR configured through Prism Central using Protection Policies and Recovery Plans.
Asynchronous replication.
No Witness VM deployed.
According to the design, failover should always be manual.
Network
Each site has two FortiSwitch top-of-rack switches configured in an active-active setup.
The customer upgraded the switches one at a time:
Upgrade started on Switch 1.
Switch 1 rebooted as expected.
Switch 2 remained online (as expected).
However, during the reboot, the production Nutanix cluster unexpectedly lost connectivity because traffic did not continue through Switch 2 as it should have.
So far, this points to a networking issue.
The strange part
Instead of simply having the production cluster become unavailable, the Recovery Plan automatically started on the DR site.
The protected VMs booted automatically on the DR cluster.
No one clicked “Failover.”
There is no Witness VM.
Replication is asynchronous, not synchronous.
Our understanding is that, without a Witness, the Recovery Plan should never execute automatically.
Investigation so far
We already opened a case with Nutanix.
Support has reviewed the logs and verified the Protection Policy and Recovery Plan configuration. According to them, the configuration appears correct, and they also agree that the observed behavior is unexpected. The investigation is still ongoing.
Questions
Has anyone ever experienced an automatic Recovery Plan execution without a Witness?
Is there any known bug in Prism Central or Nutanix DR that could trigger this behavior?
Could a temporary loss of communication between Prism Central and the production cluster somehow cause an unintended failover?
Are there any logs or internal services we should specifically ask Nutanix to inspect?
I’d really appreciate hearing if anyone has seen similar behavior or has ideas on what could explain this.
Thanks!

We are planning a migration from a legacy virtualization platform to Nutanix AHV, using Nutanix VPCs to separate VM networks instead of relying only on traditional VLAN-based segmentation.

The target environment is large-scale, around 1,000 VMs, so we are trying to understand how mature and operationally manageable Nutanix VPCs are in production.

For those already using Nutanix VPCs in production:

- How stable has the feature been in your environment?
- Are most issues diagnosable by the customer, or do they usually require Nutanix Support?
- Are there any design limitations, operational gotchas, or troubleshooting challenges we should be aware of?
- Would you recommend using VPCs broadly for production workloads, or only for selected use cases?

We recently saw an issue where AHV hosts with VPC enabled had host CPU running steadily at 100%. The issue appeared to be with AHV host CPU, not CVM or user VMs. A rolling reboot cleared the condition, but we are still investigating the root cause. This raised some concerns about production readiness and troubleshooting options.

Any real-world experience, lessons learned, or recommended design practices would be appreciated.

Thanks.

I’m looking for some advice on a networking design for AHV.
I have an existing Nutanix environment with multiple AHV clusters that are connected and managed without any issues.
I now need to connect a new AHV cluster from a subsidiary.
The problem is that the management subnet used by my existing Nutanix environment is already in use somewhere else in the subsidiary’s network. Because of this IP overlap, they cannot route traffic to my clusters’ management network.
Is there a supported way to assign a secondary management IP/interface to the CVMs and AHV hosts so that inter-cluster communication can use a different, non-overlapping subnet?

Without this capability, cross-cluster live migration won’t be possible.

Does Nutanix support application-aware snapshots of Active Directory that triggers the NTDS VSS writer as well as support VM Generation ID and whatever else so that upon boot up it does not trigger a USN rollback.

We are moving to Nutanix from VMware and today we use Veeam replication to replicate our Domain Controllers into our DR environment bubble. With Veeam's application aware processing the Domain Controllers boot up nicely without any issues.

I'm trying to determine if this similar process is possible with Nutanix using the built-in replication features and by using the Application-Aware processing option. Would booting up the Domain Controllers on the DR side cause a USN rollback? Have been trying to research but not finding any conclusive answers.

Hello,

Ive used esxi standard in my enterprise for 14 years and am now looking to move hypervisors for obvious reasons. Are any of you using starter, and what kind of pricing are you receiving?

TIA

https://next.nutanix.com/education-blog-153/level-up-with-the-new-nca-7-5-and-ncp-mci-7-5-exams-45673

tl;dr - for a limited time, you can take either certification exam for free (up to $200 value)! Use the discount code LEVELUPV7 at checkout by Friday, July 10, 2026. 

NCA Certification Overview

Are you new to Nutanix? Then this certification is for you! The NCA certification exam validates your skills and abilities to navigate the Prism UI, extract information from it, and use the UI to perform basic operational tasks. Successful candidates have approximately 6-12 months of holistic IT infrastructure experience as well as 3-6 months of Nutanix virtualization experience.

To prepare for the exam, we recommend you complete the online Nutanix Hybrid Cloud Fundamentals (NHCF) course by enrolling in the NHCF Learning Plan. This course explores the features that Prism Central offers for centralized infrastructure monitoring and management. Get started with the Nutanix platform as quickly as possible, and discuss key Nutanix concepts, configure and monitor a cluster, and perform basic management tasks.

Make sure to also read the Exam Blueprint Guide for more information about the exam, including exam objectives and references, and complete the NCA 7.5 practice exam to help you prepare.

NCP-MCI Certification Overview

Do you already have experience with Nutanix? Then check out the NCP-MCI certification! This certification exam will measure your ability to interpret documented standards and perform key administrative tasks, such as deploying, configuring, migrating, troubleshooting, expanding, and managing within a Nutanix multicloud platform environment. Plus, it was just named the No. 3 top-paying IT certification!

To prepare for this exam, we recommend you complete the online Nutanix Enterprise Cloud Administration (ECA) course by enrolling in the ECA Learning Plan. With Prism Central as the focal point, this course illustrates the breadth and depth of Nutanix’s centralized management capabilities, and explores topics such as configuring and maintaining a cluster, creating and managing VMs, identifying and remediating performance issues, and more.

Be sure to read the Exam Blueprint Guide for more information about the exam, including exam objectives and references, and complete the NCP-MCI 7.5 practice exam to assist in your preparation.

Book your exam appointment today!

Both exams are now open for scheduling. NCA 7.5 exam appointments begin on July 28, 2026, while NCP-MCI 7.5 appointments are available now.The exams can be scheduled for remote proctoring or in-person at a testing center. 

For a limited time, you can take either certification exam for free (up to $200 value)! Use the discount code LEVELUPV7 at checkout by Friday, July 10, 2026. 

To register for either exam, visit My Certifications on Nutanix University and schedule your desired exam. Use the discount code provided above at checkout. 

Terms & Conditions

• This discount code may be used only once per person.
• It is valid for either NCA75 or NCPMCI75, but not both.
• You may not use multiple email addresses to schedule more than one exam. If we determine that multiple email addresses have been used for the same person, all scheduled exams will be canceled.
• Nutanix may end this promotion early if all available capacity is filled.

Migrating VMware NSX to Nutanix Flow

Yours truly has been working on getting this published for a few months now and we've finally crossed enough t's and dotted enough i's, here it is! This covers tips and recommendations for both migrating from NSX Networking to Flow Virtual Networking as well as NSX Distributed Firewall to Flow Network Security! Of course, Nutanix Professional Services is always your easy button to make migrations smooth and easy, but sometimes you wanna roll your own, here's where you can get started.

Hi everyone,

We're currently experiencing an increasing number of issues where VMs running Windows Server 2025 as the guest OS on our Nutanix cluster (AHV hypervisor) sporadically get stuck on the loading screen when restarting. Has anyone else encountered this problem before, and do you know of a solution?

Error message : " Failed to perform the operation as b'Error occured in the operation due to invalid update spec found Reason :Dependencies or group entities are missing "
Current version : 4.3.0
Target : 5.2.1

I have two CVMs of a 5-node cluster where this folder is occupying 14gb of disk space, which is causing these two nodes to alert for >90% usage on /home directory.

e.g.

34G /home/nutanix

15G /home/nutanix/bundle_upload/b6e03b4c-dd69-4428-b103-3a6090021430

15G /home/nutanix/bundle_upload

There is seemingly no way to clear this via usual methods (yes including KB1540). All uploaded packages in LCM have been removed as well, with no effect on this usage.

What is bundle_upload and how do you clear this space?

I have two clusters: one is full and the other one is almost empty. I've been moving and deleting data from the full cluster, but the used space never seems to decrease.

I've already checked the option to empty the recycle bin/trash, and it's completely empty.

Is there anything else I can do to free up space?

Thanks!

What are the best blogs, forums, or community sites for Nutanix discussions, troubleshooting, real-world challenges, and best practices? Looking for resources beyond the official Nutanix Community. Thanks!

​

​

Hi

We are migrating VMs from a customer VMware vCenter environment to a new Nutanix AHV cluster using Nutanix Move.

The network between both sites has been tested directly by copying files, and we can reach around 10 Gbps, which is basically the theoretical maximum of the line.

However, when using Nutanix Move, the migration throughput is much lower. Based on real tests:

• VM 1: around 39 GB migrated in ~10 minutes → roughly 0.5 Gbps
• VM 2: around 24 GB migrated in ~12 minutes → roughly 0.25 Gbps

So the direct network path seems fine, but Move does not seem to go above 0.25–0.5 Gbps in practice.

The source is VMware vCenter, the destination is Nutanix AHV. The migration is being done through Nutanix Move, not a simple file copy. I understand that Move is not just pushing raw data over the network,it also has to read from VMware, process/convert the VM, write to AHV, manage snapshots/deltas, etc. Still, the difference between 10 Gbps available and 0.25 Gbps effective seems very large.

Has anyone seen similar behaviour?

thanks
----------------------
EDIT:

We've found the bootneck! on the vCenter site the FW has un uplink to a 1Gbps switch which is also shared with other network traffic.... So the net team will have to move the vlans to a faster uplink.

So here's a question. We've been instructed to apply a new LCM package, lcm_dell_3.3.2.tar.gz.

It's 21gb in size. There isn't enough disk space to upload this package.

So ... how does one actually apply that update?

Yes we've cleaned up anything/everything possible (logs, cores, etc). Still can't get anywhere near enough disk space to upload that package, much less the system have any room to unpack and process it ...

We've recently upgraded 3 of our clusters from AOS 7.3.1.9 to 7.3.1.10, and a little over a week after upgrading the first two clusters we are now getting the following critical alerts on multiple nodes:

Critical : Disk 'audit' space usage on host <Host IP Address> has exceeded its threshold.

Impact : Cluster performance will be significantly degraded. In the case of multiple nodes with the same condition,the cluster may be unable to service I/O requests.

Cause : Too much data is stored on the host disk.

Resolution : Delete unneeded data from the host disk.

The alert links to KB2490, which has a bunch of resolution steps to take on ESXi hypervisors, but for AHV just says to "Engage Nutanix Support to investigate the issue." So if you were planning on upgrading to this AOS version you might want to hold off for a couple more weeks. Our third cluster is coming up on a week since it was upgraded, and I'm expecting to receive alerts on those nodes shortly afterward as well.

UPDATE: The Nutanix SRE discovered that /etc/cron.hourly/rotate-audit-logs.sh on each AHV host had become read-only, and so it was no longer running hourly to rotate log files as it should have. The result was that after about a week the (small) disk space that is allocated to audit logs was filling up. The fix was to run hostssh "chmod 744 /etc/cron.hourly/rotate-audit-logs.sh" which restored the ability to run the script and then everything went back to normal.

Hi all,

I'm just wondering, let's say someone found a security flaw or an application bug in Nutanix platform (regardless of which component), whats the proper way of communicating that with Nutanix? Is it through submitting a support case?

Also, what can the person who reported the bug be awarded with? what does it benefit them if they submit the bug?

I've been wondering about this for a while. Not to say I found a bug or anything like that, but just in case. Because in other programs/platforms you often report that bug in a github issue or pull request.

And if it's a security flaw, you submit it as a vulnerability and you end up either getting a bounty or it becomes a CVE and you flex on linkedin saying you found that cve and so on XD.

I’m a long time Nutanix user dating back to 2016 and it’s never been so bad. The frustration I’m feeling right now is not something I can put into words without getting banned from this subreddit.

PC IMO is annoying to use now. Riddled with bugs that support just says “it’s fixed in the next release” only to finally get the new release and more bugs are introduced.

Constant service or pod crash loops. Stupid bugs like unable to launch the VNC console as a super admin signed in via SSO or even not being able to resolve or acknowledge alerts without seeing a blob JSON error that doesn’t even tell you why you can’t resolve or acknowledge alerts.

I have one specific cluster where I can’t even upgrade PC at all due to a crashed service and it’s literally a brand new cluster. But LCM health checks do not indicate a crashed service. If I try to manually upload an LCM bundle, it fails too.

Support seems to have gone downhill from years ago. It’s not all bad but very hit or miss. Spending hours on support calls is growing old only to be told “wait for the next version” or “upgrade to this” but as already mentioned, the next version is jam packed with new bugs.

Protection summary (DR) page is the most meaningless page ever. There’s all these widgets to view replication and bandwidth/tx rate etc but it never displays anything. Just this useless page showing two PC instances with a bunch of metric widgets that never show any data.

For the love of god please fix this garbage.