NCP-EUC Exam Questions Tutorials

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation From Exact Extract of Nutanix End User Computing documents:

According to Nutanix storage best practices for Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI), the optimal configuration for Linked Clones is Compression Only.

Linked Clones and Data Efficiency: In a Linked Clone environment, the Virtual Machines (VMs) already share a common base image (replica disk) at the hypervisor level. Because the identical operating system data is already shared via the cloning technology, the Nutanix Distributed Storage Fabric (DSF) manages this duplicate data efficiently without needing the Deduplication feature enabled on the container.

Redundancy of Deduplication: Nutanix technical documentation explicitly states that for Linked Clones or Nutanix VAAI clones, deduplication provides no additional benefit because the data is already single-instanced. Enabling deduplication in this scenario would introduce unnecessary metadata overhead without delivering significant capacity savings.

Role of Compression: Inline Compression is recommended for almost all workloads, including VDI. It effectively reduces the size of the unique data written to the delta disks (user data, temp files, and logs) associated with non-persistent desktops, maximizing storage efficiency without the performance cost of deduplication.

Shadow Clones: For the read-heavy workload of 2000 desktops accessing the same base image, Nutanix utilizes Shadow Clones (enabled by default) to cache the "hot" replica disk locally on every node, ensuring high performance during boot storms, rendering the need for "performance tier deduplication" redundant for linked clones.

Summary of Best Practice:

Full Clones / Persistent Desktops: Compression + Deduplication.

Linked Clones / Non-Persistent Desktops: Compression Only.

One of them is Nutanix Frame, which is a cloud-based service that delivers virtual apps and desktops from any cloud provider or on-premises datacenter.

Nutanix Frame simplifies VDI deployment by providing automated cloud resource orchestration, user session brokering, and environment administration.

Another solution is Nutanix Citrix Cloud, which is a hybrid cloud solution that integrates Nutanix HCI with Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops service.

Nutanix Citrix Cloud enables VDI deployment by providing centralized management and delivery of virtual apps and desktops through Citrix Cloud Services.

According to Nutanix best practices2, one of the steps needed for deploying VDI with Nutanix Citrix Cloud is to configure the PE Citrix Connection.

This step involves creating a connection between the Nutanix Prism Element (PE) cluster and the Citrix Cloud account, which allows Nutanix to register as a resource location for Citrix Cloud Services.

This connection also enables Nutanix to provide performance metrics, alerts, and actions for the virtual apps and desktops running on Nutanix HCI.

Nutanix's Shadow Clones feature is used to create linked clones or snapshots of base VMs, which can improve VM provisioning time and storage efficiency by reducing the amount of duplicated data.

If an administrator disables Shadow Clones within a company's VDI environment, it is likely that deployment times would increase as the number of deployed desktops increases. This is because linked clones or snapshots would no longer be used, so each new desktop deployment would require creating a full copy of the base VM.

Nutanix Shadow Clones allow for distributed caching of a particular disk or VM data, which are in a ‘multi-reader’ scenario. This can help in scenarios such as VDI or private clone boot storms, where VMs on multiple nodes read from the same set of base disks12

Comprehensive and Detailed Explanation From Exact Extract of Nutanix End User Computing documents:

According to the Prism Central User Guide (Analysis and Planning):

Analysis Sessions: Prism Central includes a feature called "Analysis" (or Performance Analysis). It allows administrators to create "Sessions" which are essentially saved workspaces.

Workflow: An administrator can select a specific metric (like Storage Controller IOPS), click "Add to Analysis," and save it to a new or existing session. This allows them to "quickly review... at a later date" by simply opening the saved Analysis Session, which retrieves the data dynamically, rather than relying on static exports or reports.