Tag: ONTAP

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Nutanix Collector vs Dell RVTools: A Comparative Analysis

In today’s complex IT environments, tools that provide insights into infrastructure performance and utilization are crucial. Nutanix Collector and Dell RVTools are two solutions, each with its unique features and benefits. This blog post will compare these tools based on various factors to help you choose the right one for your needs.

Performance Data Collection

Nutanix Collector

Nutanix Collector offers performance data collection for up to one week. This capability allows administrators to monitor and analyze system performance over a meaningful period, helping to identify trends and potential issues before they become critical. This is also very useful when right-sizing your existing environment.

Dell RVTools

RVTools, on the other hand, does not support performance data collection. This limitation might be a drawback for those who require detailed performance metrics to manage and size their infrastructure effectively.

Multi-Hypervisor Support

Nutanix Collector

Nutanix Collector supports multiple hypervisors, including ESXi, AHV, and Hyper-V. This versatility makes it an excellent choice for heterogeneous environments with different hypervisors.

Dell RVTools

RVTools is limited to ESXi only. While this might be sufficient for VMware-centric environments, it lacks the flexibility needed for mixed-hypervisor setups.

Extended Storage Support for ESXi

Nutanix Collector

Nutanix Collector and RVTools support extended storage options for ESXi environments, including RDM (planned in v5.2), vVOL, and vSAN. This feature is essential for environments leveraging advanced storage technologies.

Dell RVTools

RVTools also supports these extended storage options, providing parity with Nutanix Collector in this aspect.

Support for Capacity Workloads

Nutanix Collector

Nutanix Collector stands out by supporting capacity workloads such as NetApp ONTAP and MSSQL. This feature is particularly beneficial for enterprises that rely on these technologies for their data storage and database needs.

Dell RVTools

RVTools does not offer support for these capacity workloads, which may limit its usefulness in environments where these technologies are prevalent.

Native Cloud Support

Nutanix Collector

One of Nutanix Collector’s significant advantages is its native cloud support, including AWS (180 days of performance data) and Azure (90 days of performance data). This capability is critical for businesses leveraging cloud services and looking to move towards hybrid multi-cloud strategies.

Dell RVTools

RVTools does not provide native cloud support, which could be a considerable drawback for organizations with hybrid or multi-cloud strategies.

Data Visualization

Nutanix Collector

Nutanix Collector includes a portal or cloud version for rich data visualization, offering a comprehensive view of the infrastructure’s health and performance. This feature is crucial for making data-driven decisions and identifying issues quickly.

Dell RVTools

RVTools lacks built-in data visualization capabilities in its free version. While a paid version may offer this feature, it represents an additional cost.

Utilization Metrics and VM Provisioning Status

Nutanix Collector

Nutanix Collector provides utilization metrics at the cluster, host, and VM levels, along with VM provisioning status. This granular level of detail helps administrators optimize resource allocation, manage workloads efficiently, and right-size the environment.

Dell RVTools

RVTools does not offer these detailed utilization metrics or VM provisioning status, potentially limiting its effectiveness in comprehensive resource management and right-sizing the environment.

Networking Topology Support

Nutanix Collector

Nutanix Collector supports standard virtual networking topology, which is essential for understanding and managing network configurations in virtualized environments. Support for distributed virtual networking topology is planned in an upcoming release, version 5.2

Dell RVTools

RVTools supports both standard and distributed virtual networking topology, giving it an edge in environments where distributed networking is utilized.

Masking Sensitive Information

Nutanix Collector

Nutanix Collector includes features for masking sensitive information and enhancing security and compliance, particularly in environments dealing with sensitive or regulated data.

Dell RVTools

RVTools does not offer features for masking sensitive information, which could be a concern for organizations prioritizing data privacy.

Operating System Support

Nutanix Collector

Nutanix Collector supports multiple operating systems, including Windows, Linux, and Mac. This cross-platform compatibility makes it a versatile tool for diverse IT environments.

Dell RVTools

RVTools is limited to Windows only, restricting its use in environments with a mix of operating systems.

Conclusion

Both Nutanix Collector and Dell RVTools offer valuable features for managing and monitoring virtualized environments. However, Nutanix Collector provides a more comprehensive set of capabilities, including multi-hypervisor support, native cloud integration, advanced workload support, and cross-platform compatibility. While Dell RVTools has strengths in networking topology and is suitable for VMware-centric environments, its limitations in performance data collection, workload support, and data security features make Nutanix Collector a more robust and versatile choice for most enterprises.

Choosing the right tool ultimately depends on your specific needs and environment.

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Collector 4.1

Nutanix Collector 4.1 release is focused on the stability of the data collection, enhancements & bug fixes. Below is a summary of the changes. 

ENHANCEMENTS

Following are the feature enhancements made in this release:

  • ONTAP CIFS Shares

Collector can now identify the storage associated with CIFS Share Home Directories

“Search Path” column is added for CIFS shares configured as home directories, this helps in mapping Volume associated with Home Directories

  • Added Support to report Storage associated via Volume Groups

VolumeGroups sheet now reports all the volume groups that are associated with the discovered VMs – 

vDisk sheet now reports the vDisks that are part of Volume Group. Additional columns under vDisk are – Volume Group Name, Volume Group Disk, Volume Group Shared, Disk UUID, Volume Group UUID

vmList sheet now reports if the VM has Volume Groups attached. Additional columns under vmList are – Volume Group Attached, Volume Group Capacity (MiB) & Volume Group Consumed (MiB)

  • Added support to gather multiple NICs associated with a VM via Prism Element

If a VM supports multiple Network Interface Cards (NICs), the Collector output exported as an XLSX shows all the supported NICs in the vNetwork tab.

COLLECTOR PORTAL ENHANCEMENTS

The below enhancements are available in Collector Portal as part of his release

  • Collector Portal now supports a simple 1-click option to export NetApp ONTAP projects to Size Nutanix Files

Export to Sizer is supported for Collections gathered via Collector 4.1 and later versions

Export to XLSX is supported for Collections irrespective of Collector version

  • When exporting data to Sizer, the “Provisioned Capacity” is the default storage selection

Users are free to switch to “Consumed Capacity”

Defaulting to “Provisioned Capacity” is applied for both compute based workloads and Netapp ONTAP capacity workloads

  • Optimized the process of fetching VM information when dealing with a large number (1K+) of VMs
  • Improved the histogram chart under the VMs Summary tab by ignoring the powered OFF VMs when showing the distribution of VMs by CPU utilization. 
  • Collector provides a specific error message and suggests actions when the user is not registered on the Sizer portal and tries to export Collector Project to Sizer. 

RESOLVED ISSUES

The following issues are resolved in this release:

  • Resolved an issue where the Collector Portal was unable to generate an XLSX file when NetApp ONTAP Volume did not report Consumed Capacity & Snapshot Reserved Capacity.
  • Significantly improved the time taken to gather information via Prism when Collector is unable to gather Guest OS information.
  • Resolved an issue with Data Collection when gathering data via Prism due to the failure of Prism APIs. 
  • Resolved the cluster connection issue when trying to gather data via the Prism version AOS 5.15.4
  • Data collection completes successfully when clusters intermittently fail to report performance data.  
  • Resolved an issue in collecting the vNetwork data for AOS 5.20.2.1 (AHV – 20201105.2244) and higher versions.
  • Resolved the data center name identified by the Collector for the Prism Element clusters.

RESOURCES

Short Demo link: Collector ONTAP Export to Sizer

CALL TO ACTION

Simplify your requirement gathering by downloading Collector

Download Collector via Collector Login Page

Public URL: Collector Download Link for Prospects

MyNutanix URL: Collector Download Link for MyNutanix Users 

Report issues in Collector via this Google form

Thank you,

Team Nutanix Collector

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Collector 4.0

Nutanix Collector 4.0 fully supports NetApp Clustered Data ONTAP CIFS Shares and a lot of other benefits. Here is a short summary:

WHAT’S NEW

Support for NetApp Clustered Data ONTAP CIFS Shares

Support for NetApp Clustered Data ONTAP is no longer beta, it is now GA and full support would be provided to gather CIFS Shares details from Clustered Data ONTAP version 8.3 or above. You can gather a valuable set of information directly from storage native boxes that can be extremely helpful in sizing your File Share requirements accurately. 

Cluster details – Capacity, Storage Efficiency, # of CIFS Shares & # of Volumes

Node details – Node Health, Model, Vendor, ONTAP version, CPU & Memory info

Share details – Type of Share, Share Path, Access Control Levels, and Max Connections

Volume details – Capacity, Storage Efficiency, QoS Level, Snapshot & Backup Details

QoS details – Policy Group, Max Throughput & Workload Count

Short Demo link: Nutanix Collector support for ONTAP

Masking Sensitive Information

Collector 4.0 also provides the option to mask sensitive information when exporting the output to excel. This would be beneficial in the case of Government and Financial accounts or RFPs demanding the same. The following fields are masked across the various sheets – Cluster Name, Host IP, Host Name, VM Name, Disk Name, Snapshot Name, Snapshot File, Switch Name, Port Group, vSwitch, Network, Adapter, Disk, License Name & License Key.

Mapping of Collector Project & Sizer Scenarios

Collector Portal now allows you to not only view the Collector Projects but also allows you to view the associated Sizer Scenarios. To make it even better, we have ensured that you can also see the associated Sizer Scenarios for all your existing Collector Projects as well. This would be extremely beneficial in case of any customer satisfaction issues where the workload has changed pre and post-deployment.  

Bulk edits on VM List Page

This has been a long-pending request, Collector Portal allows you to edit multiple VMs in one go via “Bulk Change”. Use cases where bulk edits would be of great value

Sizing a set of VMs in one cluster and the rest in another cluster. For example, all DB VMs “Target Cluster” values can be changed to a new cluster, say DB Cluster instead of default Cluster 1.   The rest of the VMs can be left to default, Cluster 1, or further targeted towards specific clusters before exporting to Sizer.

Edit the resources allocated to the set of VMs. For example, all knowledge workers are not allocated enough vCPUs, increase all of them at once via bulk edit.

Additional Checks for Potential Undersizing when exporting to Sizer

In the case of virtual desktop environments, not all the VMs are utilized at the same time, especially when users are working across shifts. The VMs might be actively utilizing the resources but the VM might be switched off when Collector is run to gather the data. Considering the VM as OFF might result in a potentially undersized solution. We have added warnings in place to avoid these kinds of issues both when exporting Collector data to Sizer or Importing Collector data in Sizer.

ENHANCEMENTS

Identification of Home Directory & Application Shares

Collector 4.0 can identify if the shares configured on ONTAP CIFS are Home Directory shares or Applications shares. Sizer shall support exporting home directory shares only or all discovered shares.

Ease of Download

No need to remember any URLs to download Collector Desktop Application. Just ask the partner, prospect or customer to visit https://collector.nutanix.com/ or Google “Nutanix Collector”. Find the “Download Collector Desktop Application” right on the login page. 

Retrieving back the Collection File (.zip)

We have also made minor adjustments in the placement of buttons to drive our users towards sharing the Collection (.zip) file over the .xlsx file.  The updated button also indicates to the users that the Collection file is a zip file and not xlsx file. Use of the Collection file helps to extract all the value-added in the Collector portal and now you can also map the Collector data to Sizer Scenarios. 

RESOLVED ISSUES

Resolved Out of Memory issues when trying to gather data from large Prism environments.

In the case of Hyper-V, Collector can now generate the output in the Excel (.xlsx) format, even when a few attributes for VMs, Cluster Name, and Disk Name are missing.

RESOURCES

Release Notes, User Guide & Security Guide

Collector Help Pages

Collector FAQs 

Product Videos

Report issues in Collector via this Google form

Download Collector via Collector Login Page

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Collector 3.5.1

Nutanix Collector 3.5.1 goes beyond compute-focused workloads, Collector has now added support for the first of the many upcoming capacity-focused workloads. Here is a short summary:

WHAT’S NEW

Collector now provides you an option to collect data for NetApp Clustered DATA ONTAP (8.3 or above) File Shares, CIFS. Collector allows you to collect data directly from the native storage boxes. You can gather a valuable set of information that can be extremely helpful in sizing your File Share requirements accurately. 

Cluster details – Capacity, Storage Efficiency, # of CIFS Shares & # of Volumes

Node details – Node Health, Model, Vendor, ONTAP version, CPU & Memory info

Share details – Share Path, Access Control Levels, and Max Connections

Volume details – Capacity, Storage Efficiency, QoS Level, Snapshot & Backup Details

QoS details – Policy Group, Max Throughput & Workload Count

Short Demo link: Nutanix Collector support for ONTAP

ENHANCEMENTS

Guest OS details are now available in the case of AHV if NGT is installed and enabled. The Guest OS details can be seen within the “VM Summary” page and the same can be viewed under the “vInfo” tab of the XLSX file. 

Collector Portal – Invite & Share option allows you to share your Collector projects with users who are not registered on Collector Portal. This allows you to share your project with your peers or subject matter experts for collaboration and discussion.

RESOLVED ISSUES

Resolved inconsistencies around CPU & Memory dials seen in AHV collections.

Resolved issues in vCenter collections – CPU & Memory charts displaying more than 100%

RESOURCES

Release Notes, User Guide & Security Guide

Collector Help Pages

Collector FAQs 

Product Videos

Public URL: Collector Download Link for Prospects

MyNutanix URL: Collector Download Link for MyNutanix Users