Nutanix NCP-CI-AWS Dumps

When reserving licenses for Nutanix Cloud Clusters (NC2), administrators must understand the inclusion of add-ons within different tiers. For organizations requiring multi-protocol storage, the Nutanix Unified Storage (NUS) add-on is flexible and can be associated with either the NCI Pro or NCI Ultimate licensing tiers. Furthermore, the NCI Ultimate tier is designed to be comprehensive; it automatically includes high-value features such as Advanced Replication and Security (Microsegmentation) by default. This simplifies the licensing process because these features do not require separate manual applications once the Ultimate tier is selected. While NCI Ultimate is feature-rich, it does not include the NUS add-on by default, which remains a capacity-based selection that must be specifically managed alongside the base license tier.

The 192.168.5.0/24 range is often reserved for internal cluster communication within Nutanix deployments.

Using this CIDR range for other purposes could lead to network conflicts and connectivity issues, as it might interfere with the internal operations and communication channels of the Nutanix cluster.

Ensuring that the CIDR range is not overlapping with any reserved ranges is crucial for maintaining proper network connectivity and cluster functionality.

Refer to the Nutanix documentation on network configuration and best practices for NC2 deployments to confirm reserved IP ranges and their appropriate use.

To ensure continuous availability and maintain the specified Replication Factor (RF) during maintenance or hardware issues, Nutanix follows a proactive " provision before removal " logic for host replacement in the cloud. The correct operational sequence begins with adding a new host to the cluster first. This step expands the cluster ' s capacity and ensures there is a destination ready for data synchronization. Once the new host is fully integrated into the storage fabric, the system migrates the virtual machines and their associated data away from the degraded or old host. Only after the old host has been completely evacuated and the cluster returns to a healthy, balanced state does the NC2 console conclude the operation by removing the old host from the cluster configuration.

In the NC2 console, an organization is used to segregate clusters based on specific requirements. This segregation allows administrators to manage clusters more effectively by grouping them according to business units, projects, or other criteria. This organizational structure helps in maintaining clear boundaries and applying specific policies or permissions to different clusters within the same NC2 environment.

Nutanix Cloud Clusters on AWS Administration

Nutanix Certified Professional - Cloud Integration - AWS

Integrating Flow Virtual Networking (FVN) into an NC2 cluster necessitates the creation of specific management and transit subnets to coordinate the overlay traffic. The administrator must ensure that aPrism Central subnet is configured on the Prism Elementside to facilitate the management link between the cluster nodes and the centralized management instance. Additionally, aTransit subnet must be configured on Prism Central. This transit subnet is critical because it houses the virtual routing components and gateways that manage traffic flow between different VPCs and the external network. By establishing these two subnets, the administrator provides the necessary control plane and data plane paths for the FVN overlay to communicate effectively with the underlying AWS infrastructure and the broader Nutanix management ecosystem.

Nutanix offers two flexible paths for provisioning the underlying AWS networking infrastructure required for an NC2 cluster. The first option is toallow the NC2 portal to automatically deploy the required AWS resources. In this guided workflow, the portal uses predefined CloudFormation templates to create the VPC, subnets, NAT gateways, and routing tables based on the administrator ' s input. The second option is the " Bring Your Own " (BYO) manual workflow, where the administrator uses their own existing AWS networking resources. This is often preferred by large organizations with strict security requirements or pre-existing VPC architectures. Both methods are fully supported, allowing organizations to choose between the speed of automated deployment or the granular control of a manual networking setup.

While Nutanix provides multiple management interfaces, each serves a distinct purpose in the hybrid cloud lifecycle. Prism Central and Prism Element are used for managing software-level entities like VMs, storage containers, and replication policies. However, for thedefinitive status of the cluster ' s cloud infrastructure—including whether the bare-metal nodes are provisioned, if the cluster is in a " Healthy, " " Degraded, " or " Failed " state, or if a " boot timeout " has occurred—administrators must usethe NC2 Portal. The NC2 Portal acts as the primary orchestration layer that bridges Nutanix and AWS; it is the only console that displays specific cloud deployment tasks, hardware replacement status, and AWS-raised infrastructure events in a unified view.

AVTEP (VXLAN Tunnel Endpoint) Gatewayshowing a status of " Down " indicates a connectivity or configuration failure within the control plane. In an NC2 environment, the gateway relies on consistent communication withPrism Central (PC)for management and synchronization, as well asNTP and DNSfor time-sync and name resolution. If the route tables in the AWS VPC are missing the necessary entries to reach these management services, the VTEP gateway will fail to initialize or maintain its heartbeat, resulting in a " Down " status. While on-premises reachability is important for traffic flow, the failure to create the extension entirely usually points to these missing internal routes that prevent the Nutanix software components from coordinating correctly within the cloud environment.

When extending a Layer 2 subnet from on-premises to NC2 on AWS, the default gateway often remains at the on-premises location.

For Virtual Machines (VMs) running on the NC2 cluster in AWS to communicate with resources outside their immediate subnet, their traffic must be directed back through the tunnel to the on-premises gateway. This is achieved by configuring arouting policyon the NC2 cluster with aForward action. This policy identifies traffic destined for the gateway and encapsulates it via the VTEP (VXLAN Tunnel Endpoint) using port 4789. Without this forward action policy, the AWS-based VMs would attempt to find a local gateway within the AWS VPC, resulting in a loss of connectivity for any North-South traffic.

Cross Cluster Live Migration allows for the movement of running virtual machines between different Nutanix clusters with zero downtime.

For this feature to be supported in an NC2 on AWS environment, the deployment must utilizeFlow Virtual Networking (FVN). FVN provides the advanced software-defined networking overlay required to maintain consistent network state and connectivity for the VM as it moves between different physical bare-metal hosts in separate clusters. Standard AWS networking lacks the specific overlay capabilities necessary to handle the seamless IP mobility and session persistence required for a live migration between cloud clusters. Therefore, ensuring FVN is correctly configured is a prerequisite for achieving live mobility within the AWS NC2 ecosystem.

When deploying a new NC2 cluster, the AWS Directory Service must be able to resolve the addressgateway-external-api.cloud.nutanix.com.

This external API gateway is critical for the NC2 cluster to communicate with Nutanix services for operations such as management, updates, and licensing.

Ensuring that this address can be resolved allows the cluster to interact properly with the Nutanix cloud infrastructure and services.

Refer to the Nutanix documentation on network and DNS requirements for NC2 deployments, specifically the addresses that need to be resolvable for proper functionality.

For a VM to be accessible over the internet through a load balancer, the VM itself must have a public IP address.

In this case, the health check for the VM target is failing and the DNS returns a " NOT Found " message because web-1 does not have a public IP assigned.

Without a public IP, the load balancer cannot route traffic to web-1 from the internet.

Assigning a public IP to web-1 ensures that the VM can be accessed via the load balancer, resolving the connectivity issue.

Refer to the AWS documentation on network load balancers and public IP assignments, and Nutanix documentation on VM network configurations.

With the Nutanix AOS Pro licensing, several advanced features and add-on products become available. Specifically, in the AWS cluster deployment wizard, the following add-ons are available:

Files:

Nutanix Files provides a software-defined, scale-out file storage solution that simplifies the management and scaling of unstructured data.

Advanced Replication:

Advanced Replication features in Nutanix include synchronous and asynchronous replication capabilities, allowing for robust disaster recovery and data protection solutions.

DARE (Data-At-Rest Encryption):

DARE ensures that all data stored on Nutanix clusters is encrypted, providing a higher level of security for sensitive information.

These features are included in the AOS Pro licensing tier, offering enhanced data management, protection, and security capabilities.

Nutanix Licensing Guide

Nutanix Cloud Clusters on AWS Administration Guide

Nutanix Best Practices for Advanced Features

Given the company ' s large spend commitments as part of an AWS Enterprise Discount Program (EDP) totaling $15 million, purchasing Nutanix licenses through the AWS Marketplace ensures that the costs contribute to the EDP commitment.

This approach integrates the Nutanix license costs into the overall AWS spend, thereby maximizing the benefits of the EDP.

Purchasing directly from Nutanix or leveraging existing licenses might not count towards the AWS EDP commitment, and trial licenses are typically for evaluation purposes and do not contribute to the committed spend.

Refer to the Nutanix and AWS documentation on licensing and marketplace purchases, and EDP program details.

Ensure the specialist is assigned the RBAC role with proper permissions (Answer A):

Role-Based Access Control (RBAC) ensures that the specialist has the necessary permissions to troubleshoot and manage the NC2 environment. This avoids unnecessary privilege escalations and maintains security.

Confirm the Support Authorization on the organization is set to Full Access (Answer C):

Setting the Support Authorization to Full Access allows the Nutanix support specialist to have the required access to investigate and resolve issues in the environment. This is essential for effective troubleshooting.

Nutanix RBAC Documentation

Nutanix Support Access Guide

For the NC2 cluster deployed in the North Virginia region (us-east-id), consuming IPs from the 10.78.2.0/24 range, the subnets configured within the same CIDR range of 10.78.0.0/16 will be recognized.

The subnetDR01 (10.78.2.0/24)is directly within the range of the deployed cluster.

The subnetL2stretch (10.19.101.0/24)is also configured in the NC2 AWS VPC, although not in the immediate range of the cluster, it may show up due to broader network configurations for stretched L2 operations.

SubnetsVDI (10.78.130.0/22)andDR02 (10.79.120.0/24), although part of the same VPC, are not directly within the immediate CIDR range or may not be recognized in this specific configuration scenario.

Refer to the Nutanix documentation on NC2 AWS VPC subnet configurations and Prism Element settings for detailed guidelines on network visibility and configuration.

To manually hibernate an NC2 on AWS cluster, the administrator can use the following methods:

Select the cluster under NC2 console and Select Hibernate/Resume on the cluster sur page: Navigate to the specific cluster in the NC2 console and use the provided Hibernate/Resume option.

Log into NC2 console, find the cluster name and select Hibernate/Resume from the ellipses: Access the NC2 console, locate the cluster name, and select the Hibernate/Resume option from the ellipses (three dots) menu.

These options allow for the manual control of the cluster ' s hibernation state directly within the NC2 console interface.

Nutanix Cloud Clusters on AWS Administration

Nutanix Support and Insights

In an NC2 on AWS deployment using Flow Virtual Networking (FVN),North-South traffic(traffic moving into or out of the Nutanix VPC) is handled via adistributed gateway model. Unlike traditional setups that might rely on a single bottleneck node, the distributed gateway model allows each Nutanix node in the cluster to participate in routing traffic to the AWS VPC router. This architecture provides high availability and scales performance linearly as nodes are added to the cluster. By distributing the gateway function, Nutanix ensures that no single point of failure exists for internet-bound or cross-VPC traffic, optimizing the path between Nutanix User VMs and native AWS services or the public internet.

Nutanix provides a flexible licensing model for NC2, allowing customers to use their existingon-premises licensesthrough reservation. A key benefit of this approach is thatreserved licensed capacity automatically handles incidental overages. If a cluster temporarily scales out and exceeds the reserved capacity, the Nutanix billing system accounts for the excess usage automatically, typically by drawing from the associated Pay-As-You-Go (PAYG) account or consumption credits. This ensures that the cluster remains operational and compliant even during unexpected spikes in demand. Administrators can manage these reservations through the Nutanix portal, allowing them to balance their committed on-premises license spend with the variable needs of their cloud-resident clusters.

The scalability of Nutanix Cloud Clusters (NC2) on AWS is a critical architectural consideration for high-growth environments. While earlier versions or specific regions might have different baseline limits, the maximum size for a single NC2 cluster on AWS is officially supported up to28 nodes. This limit is designed to balance the performance benefits of the Nutanix Distributed Storage Fabric (DSF) with the underlying AWS bare-metal infrastructure and networking constraints. Expanding a cluster to this size allows for significant workload consolidation and high availability within a single management domain. Administrators must ensure that their AWS account quotas and VPC subnet sizing are sufficient to accommodate the vCPU and IP address requirements associated with a 28-node deployment to prevent provisioning failures.

The clusters that are to be protected must be registered with the same instance of Prism Central (Answer C):

For Cluster Protect to function correctly, all clusters intended for protection must be registered under the same Prism Central instance. This ensures consistent management and coordination of protection policies and operations across clusters.

The Cluster Protect feature requires AOS version 6.7 or higher (Answer D):

Cluster Protect is a feature that is available starting from AOS version 6.7. To utilize this feature, ensure that the Nutanix clusters are running this version or a newer one.

Nutanix Cluster Protection Documentation

Nutanix AOS Release Notes

ThePrism Central Marketplaceserves as the centralized hub for discovering, enabling, and managing various Nutanix services and integrated technologies. For administrators deploying NC2 on AWS, the Marketplace is the designated environment to verify the compatibility and support status ofMulticloud Snapshot Technology (MST). Within this interface, the system provides documentation and automated workflows that confirm the best installation process for the specific environment. This ensures that the required software versions and dependencies are met before attempting to protect workloads to cloud object storage like Amazon S3. Utilizing the Marketplace simplifies the " Day Two " operational tasks by providing a validated path for deployment rather than relying on manual configuration or external templates.

The maximum number of nodes supported in an NC2 cluster on AWS is 24 nodes. This limit ensures optimal performance and manageability within the AWS infrastructure while leveraging the benefits of the Nutanix architecture.

Nutanix Clusters on AWS Deployment Guide

Nutanix Support and Insights

Upon creation, each node within an AWS NC2 cluster has3 Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS)volumes attached.

These volumes are used for different purposes, such as operating system storage, Nutanix services, and user data storage.

The number of EBS volumes is designed to ensure adequate storage performance and capacity for the NC2 cluster ' s operations and workload demands.

Refer to the Nutanix documentation on NC2 cluster setup and AWS EBS volume configurations to confirm the details on the number and purpose of EBS volumes attached to each node.

A valid CIDR range: A CIDR (Classless Inter-Domain Routing) range is necessary for creating the subnets within the VPC. This range defines the IP address space for the cluster and its components.

A my.nutanix.com account: This account is required to access Nutanix services, including the NC2 console, manage licenses, and perform other administrative tasks.

AWS Direct Connect and an on-premises Prism Central environment are not prerequisites for deploying an NC2 on AWS cluster. While Direct Connect can be used for enhanced network performance and connectivity, it is not a requirement for deployment. Similarly, having an on-premises Prism Central environment is not mandatory for NC2 deployment on AWS.

Refer to the Nutanix documentation on NC2 prerequisites and setup guides, and AWS documentation on VPC and subnet creation.

For a new NC2 on AWS deployment where workload VMs have low storage and memory requirements but high CPU frequency ( > 3.0 GHz) requirements, and the goal is to minimize the number of CPU cores to reduce application licensing costs, thei3.metalinstance type is the most suitable.

i3.metal:

High CPU Frequency: i3.metal instances offer high-frequency Intel Xeon processors (up to 3.1 GHz) which meet the high CPU frequency requirement.

Low Storage and Memory: These instances come with a balanced amount of storage and memory, suitable for workloads with low requirements in these areas.

Minimized CPU Cores: i3.metal instances have fewer CPU cores compared to other high-frequency instances like i4i.metal, making them ideal for minimizing application licensing costs.

Other Instance Types:

z1d.metal: While also offering high CPU frequency, these instances typically come with a higher core count and more memory, which may not be optimal for minimizing licensing costs.

i4i.metal: Designed for I/O intensive applications with higher core counts.

m5d.metal: Balanced instance type but with more cores and not as high CPU frequency as required.

AWS EC2 Instance Types Documentation

Nutanix Cloud Clusters on AWS Administration Guide

Nutanix Best Practices for Instance Selection

When creating an NC2 cluster in AWS, the account used to run the CloudFormation script requires specific permissions to ensure the deployment is successful. The required permissions are:

IAMFullAccess: Provides full access to IAM resources.

AmazonEC2FullAccess: Allows full access to EC2 resources.

AWSCIoudFormationFullAccess: Grants full access to manage AWS CloudFormation stacks.

These permissions are necessary to create, manage, and deploy the required AWS resources for the NC2 cluster.

Nutanix Support and Insights

AWS IAM Documentation

When a " boot timeout " alert occurs during a cluster expansion, it often indicates that the NC2 console requested a new instance from AWS, but the instance failed to reach a " healthy " state within the allotted time. While networking can be a factor, common " hard " stops at the AWS API level includeService QuotasandInstance Limits. AWS accounts have default limits on the number of bare-metal instances (like i3.metal or i4i.metal) that can be active in a single region. If the expansion request exceeds thevCPU quotaor the specificinstance type limit, AWS will deny the request or fail to provision the hardware. Administrators must verify these quotas in the AWS Service Quotas console and request an increase to support the additional nodes required for the Nutanix cluster.

During the NC2 cluster creation process, the administrator is presented with options for the licensing portfolio they wish to utilize. Nutanix has transitioned to theNCI (Nutanix Cloud Infrastructure)portfolio, but the legacyAOSportfolio is still available for certain customers. If the " AOS Licenses " option appears greyed out or unselectable, it is typically becausethe administrator did not select AOS in the licensing section of the NC2 Creation Wizard. The wizard requires an explicit choice early in the workflow to determine which features and software tiers (Pro, Ultimate, etc.) will be available for selection later. If the portfolio is not correctly identified at the start, the specific license keys or reservations associated with the legacy AOS model will not be recognized by the deployment engine, defaulting instead to the newer NCI-based consumption model.

When creating a new NC2 cluster using an existing AWS VPC infrastructure, two private subnets are needed. These subnets are used as follows:

One private subnet for user VMs, which houses the virtual machines that users interact with.

Another private subnet for cluster management, which is used for internal cluster operations and management tasks, ensuring that management traffic is isolated from user traffic for security and performance reasons.

Nutanix Support and Insights

Nutanix Cloud Clusters on AWS Administration

Traffic from the on-premises network is not permitted by VM and Management security groups:

Ensure that the security groups assigned to the VMs and management interfaces in AWS allow inbound traffic from the on-premises network. Without appropriate security group rules, the traffic will be blocked.

The AWS VPC traffic is blocked by a firewall in the on-premises network:

Check if the firewall on the on-premises network is configured to allow traffic from the AWS VPC. Firewalls may have restrictive rules that block incoming traffic, preventing communication.

Refer to AWS documentation on security groups and firewalls and Nutanix documentation on configuring networking for NC2 clusters.

To ensure that the newly created NC2 organization named Finance can only deploy clusters into certain cloud regions, the administrator should specify the allowed regions during the cloud account configuration.

This action restricts the regions available for cluster deployment, ensuring compliance with organizational policies or regulatory requirements.

The allowed regions can be set in the cloud account settings associated with the Finance NC2 organization, defining the geographical scope of operations.

Refer to the Nutanix documentation on NC2 cloud account configuration and region restrictions.

Before accessing the Nutanix Cloud Clusters (NC2) console, the first step is to create a My Nutanix account.

This account serves as the primary gateway for managing and accessing Nutanix services, including NC2.

Once the account is created, users can log in to the Nutanix portal, where they can manage their subscriptions, start trials, and access various Nutanix services, including the NC2 console.

Refer to the Nutanix documentation on getting started with NC2 and the My Nutanix account creation process.

Synchronous replication requires extremely low latency (typically sub-5ms) and high throughput between the primary and secondary storage controllers. While Flow Virtual Networking (FVN) supports various multi-VPC architectures, the most robust and supported configuration for synchronous replication within a single AWS region is to ensure that both clusters reside within the same AWS VPC. This placement minimizes network hops and avoids the additional latency that might be introduced by VPC Peering or Transit Gateway traversal between separate VPCs. By sharing the same VPC, the clusters communicate over the same high-speed internal AWS network fabric, providing the deterministic performance and zero-RPO data protection required for synchronous data writes and Metro Availability configurations.

In an NC2 on AWS environment, licensing Microsoft Windows Server workloads can be complex due to cloud mobility rights.

If an organization does not have existing licenses with Software Assurance to support " Bring Your Own License " (BYOL) on cloud hardware, they must acquire licenses through the cloud provider. The most integrated and efficient way to achieve this for Nutanix clusters is to select theLicense Includedoption during the host provisioning process in the NC2 console. By purchasing nodes with licenses included, the cost of the Windows Server OS is bundled with the instance hourly rate provided by AWS. This ensures full compliance with Microsoft licensing terms without requiring a separate purchase through external marketplaces or resellers for the cloud-resident VMs.

To deploy an NC2 cluster using an existing AWS network, the NAT Gateway should be placed in a public subnet. A public subnet is one that has a route to an Internet Gateway, allowing the NAT Gateway to provide outbound internet access for resources in private subnets. The NAT Gateway is used to enable instances in private subnets to access the internet while keeping them secure by not exposing them directly to the public internet.

Nutanix Cloud Clusters (NC2) on AWS Documentation

When configuring a syslog server in the Prism Central Admin Center for Nutanix, one of the available log modules is Acropolis.

The Acropolis module logs system events related to the Nutanix Acropolis operating system, which is critical for monitoring and auditing system activities and performance.

Configuring syslog with the Acropolis module ensures that important events and issues related to the Acropolis environment are captured and can be forwarded to an external syslog server for centralized logging and analysis.

Refer to the Nutanix documentation on Prism Central and syslog configuration for the full list of available log modules and detailed steps for configuration.

WhenFlow Virtual Networking (FVN)is enabled for an NC2 cluster, Nutanix orchestrates the creation of aTransit VPCto handle traffic between the overlay and external networks. The core subnet created within this Transit VPC is namedoverlay-external-subnet-nonat. This subnet is critical as it serves as the entry and exit point for traffic that should not be subjected to address translation, such as traffic moving between the cloud overlay and an on-premises data center via a Transit Gateway or VPN. While administrators can manually add a NAT-enabled subnet later, the " nonat " variant is the primary default used to ensure that internal corporate communications remain transparent across the hybrid cloud boundary.

TheCluster Protectfeature is the native Nutanix solution designed specifically for NC2 on AWS to protect both the cluster data and thePrism Centralmanagement instance. Unlike standard replication, Cluster Protect utilizesAmazon S3 bucketsto store snapshots of the cluster configuration, Prism Central metadata, and User VM data. This is considered the " best way " for native protection because the entire recovery workflow is orchestrated directly from theNC2 console. If a cluster or an entire Availability Zone fails, the administrator can use the NC2 portal to redeploy the cluster and restore the Prism Central instance and data from the S3 bucket, eliminating the need for third-party backup software while maintaining a simple cloud-native recovery path.

When planning to leverage NC2 on AWS for an elastic DR scenario where the initial cluster is using 13en.metal, the following additional node types are supported for cluster expansion:

I3.metal: These instances provide high IOPS and low latency with NVMe SSDs, making them suitable for storage-intensive applications.

i4i.metal: These instances offer higher performance with AWS Nitro SSDs, improved network bandwidth, and better compute performance compared to the I3.metal instances.

Nutanix Cloud Clusters on AWS Documentation

Amazon EC2 I4i Instances – AWS

Amazon EC2 I3 Instances – AWS

AHV (Answer A):

AHV (Acropolis Hypervisor) can be upgraded using Lifecycle Manager (LCM). LCM simplifies the upgrade process and ensures that all components are updated in a coordinated manner.

BIOS (Answer C):

BIOS upgrades can also be performed using LCM. This helps in maintaining hardware compatibility and performance by ensuring that the latest firmware is installed.

Nutanix Lifecycle Manager (LCM) Documentation

Nutanix AHV Upgrade Guide

Nutanix BIOS Upgrade Documentation

For mission-critical workloads, the Recovery Time Objective (RTO) is a primary concern.

Multicloud Snapshot Technology (MST)coupled with aPilot Light Deploymentprovides the necessary infrastructure to support an automated recovery plan. In a Pilot Light scenario, a small, " always-on " version of the Nutanix cluster (usually the minimum number of nodes) is maintained in AWS to host Prism Central and handle background replication tasks. Because the management layer is already active, recovery plans can be fully automated to power on VMs and adjust networking instantly upon failure. In contrast, a " Zero Compute " deployment lacks an active management interface, requiring manual intervention to provision a cluster before recovery can begin, which significantly increases RTO and prevents full automation.