Top 3 Features of Nutanix AOS 5.6

On April 16th, Nutanix released it's newest version of AOS (Acropolis Operating System). The 5.6 release has 9+ new features. But rather than cover them all, I wanted to call out what I consider the top 3 features of this release.

One or Two Node Deployment for Remote / Branch Office

Many businesses face the challenge of maintaining IT resources in remote locations. Whether it be a branch office or retail outlet, choosing the right solution to provide infrastructure which is easy to deploy and manage can prove difficult. Enter AOS 5.6. With this release, Nutanix now offers a single or dual node solution for ROBO deployment. The single node deployment can support up to 5 VMs, with disk level resiliency. The two node option supports up to 10 VMs and offers node level resiliency. Both options are managed centrally via Prism Central, allowing admins to administer the nodes alongside their on-premises data center. ROBO sites can also utilize cross hypervisor DR between the remote site and the DR location. And with all other Nutanix, the ROBO sites can be remotely upgraded using the same 1 click upgrades as the local site, saving the complexity of keeping a remote office up to date.

Microsegmentation hits GA

AHV users can now benefit from the GA release of Microsegmentation. Built into 5.6 and managed via Prism, application centric policy models can be deployed using a stateful distributed firewall. Single virtual machines or groups of VMs can all be protected, including blocking east/west traffic between them. Microsegmentation offers granular application isolation and zoning without configuring VLANs.

Volume Group Load Balancing of vDisks 

For users with high IO VMs, AOS 5.6 includes the ability for AHV to load balance vDisks in a volume group. CPU and memory resources are pulled from multiple CVMs (Controller VMs). This distribution across CVMs helps to improve the performance of the virtual machine and reduce bottlenecks.

Related links

What's New | AOS 5.6 - Nutanix
VCDX133.com - Nutanix AOS 5.6 Released
VCDX56.com - Nutanix AOS & Prism Central Version 5.6 & Much More Released

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