NCP-MCI-6.10 Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Infrastructure (NCP-MCI v6.10) Questions and Answers

When usingFQDN instead of a Virtual IP in a scale-out Prism Central deployment, Nutanixenables load balancing across multiple Prism Central instances.

Option A (Load balancing) is correctbecause it ensures that requests are distributed among multiple Prism Central nodes, improving performance and redundancy.

Option B (Resiliency) is incorrectbecause resiliency is achieved through HA and replication, not through FQDN configuration.

Option C (Segmentation) is incorrectbecause network segmentation is handled at the VLAN or security policy level.

Option D (SSL Certificate) is incorrectbecause SSL certificates can be applied regardless of whether FQDN or Virtual IP is used.

In a Nutanix cluster, Replication Factor 2 (RF2) means that each piece of data has two copies: a primary and a replica. To safely remove a node while ensuring data redundancy and cluster health, the system must have enough nodes to maintain the RF2 protection and complete the removal.

From the Nutanix Enterprise Cloud Administration (ECA) documentation:

“The minimum number of nodes required for a safe host removal in an RF2 cluster is four. This ensures that even after removing a node, there are enough remaining nodes to continue hosting the primary and replica data copies, meeting the RF2 requirement.”

The logic is:

In a 3-node RF2 cluster, there isn’t enough redundancy to safely remove a node without impacting data availability.

A 4-node RF2 cluster allows safe removal of one node while still ensuring two copies of all data remain.

Thus, the minimum number of nodes required for a safe host removal in an RF2 cluster is 4

RF3 (Replication Factor 3) clusters require sufficient reserved capacity to tolerate failures without data loss.

Option C (Set Reserve Capacity for Failure to Auto Detect) is correct:

Auto Detect dynamically calculates the necessary reserved spacebased on cluster size and RF settings.

It ensures thatenough storage remains available in case of a node failure.

Option A (Set Reserve Storage Capacity to 20%) is incorrect:

The required storage reservationdepends on the number of nodes and RF level, not a fixed percentage.

Option B (Set Reserve Capacity for Failure to None) is incorrect:

Without reserved capacity,a node failure could lead to data unavailability.

Option D (Set Reserve Memory Capacity to 20%) is incorrect:

This setting applies toRAM, notstorage resiliency.

Port mirroring requires the source and target VMs to be on the same host to efficiently copy network traffic without additional routing overhead.

Option B (Source VM and Target VM are on the same host) is correct:

AHV’s port mirroringonly works within a single hostbecause network packets are intercepted before leaving the hypervisor.

If the VMs are on different hosts,mirroring cannot be configured without additional network tools.

Option A (Same VLAN) is incorrect:

VLAN membership isnot a requirementfor port mirroring.

Option C (Same subnet) is incorrect:

Port mirroring happens atthe virtual switch level, which does not require VMs to be in the same subnet.

Option D (Same VPC) is incorrect:

While VPCs provide network isolation,they do not control port mirroring availability.

To create a custom Intelligent Operations report and run it across multiple Prism Central instances, administrators must export the report configuration from one Prism Central instance and then import it into the others. This process leverages the .rpt file format, which encapsulates the report’s configuration details, including data sources, visualization preferences, and thresholds.

From theNutanix Enterprise Cloud Administration (ECA)course materials:

“Administrators can create custom Intelligent Operations reports in Prism Central and export the configuration as a .rpt file. This exported file can then be imported into other Prism Central instances, ensuring consistency across environments without requiring manual recreation of the report’s details.”

Additionally:

“The export/import feature for reports ensures that custom dashboards and reports can be easily migrated or replicated across multiple Prism Central instances, enabling a standardized approach to monitoring and analytics in a multicloud environment.”

This clearly indicates that the recommended and supported method for sharing or replicating custom reports across multiple Prism Central instances is by exporting and importing the report configurations in .rpt format. This approach avoids the need for manual recreation and ensures that the reports maintain their intended configuration and layout across different instances.

When a node is placed intoMaintenance Mode, Nutanix follows a structured process to ensureservice continuity and data integrity.

Option B (All eligible VMs on the host are migrated to other hosts) is correct:

Live Migration automatically moves VMs to other hoststo avoid downtime.

This ensures workloads remain operational during maintenance.

Option D (Non-migratable VMs are powered off) is correct:

Some VMs, such as those usingGPU pass-through or local storage dependencies,cannot be live-migrated.

These VMsmust be powered offbefore placing the host into Maintenance Mode.

Option A is incorrect:

Non-migratable VMs are not automatically restarted on other hosts—they remain powered off until manually restarted.

Option C is incorrect:

Eligible VMs are live-migrated, not powered off.

When creating a storage container in Nutanix, the administrator must configure the correctcapacity settings:

Option A (Prism Element with Advertised Capacity of 100 GiB) is correct:

Advertised Capacitydefineslogical limitsfor the container (i.e., how much space it reports as available).

Inline Compressioncan be enabled directly in Prism Element.

Option B (Create in Prism Element without Advertised Capacity)is incorrect:

Without specifyingAdvertised Capacity, the container may consume unlimited storage.

Option C (Create in Prism Central with Reserved Capacity)is incorrect:

Reserved Capacityapplies toQuality of Service (QoS) policies, not storage limits.

Option D (Create in Prism Central without capacity limits)is incorrect:

Prism Central can manage storage but does not directly enforceRF1 and compression policies.

The Nutanix ECA course addresses Metro Availability, a high-availability feature that provides synchronous replication between two Nutanix clusters for zero Recovery Point Objective (RPO) and near-zero Recovery Time Objective (RTO). The NCC warning about thebreak_replication_timeoutbeing below the recommended minimum indicates a configuration issue that could affect the stability of Metro Availability. Thebreak_replication_timeoutparameter determines how long the Protection Domain (PD) waits before breaking replication if connectivity between the Metro clusters is disrupted.

Extract from Nutanix Enterprise Cloud Administration (ECA) Course Documents:

Module: Data Protection, Section: Metro Availability Configuration"Metro Availability uses synchronous replication to ensure data consistency between two clusters. The break_replication_timeout parameter defines the timeout period for replication. The recommended minimum value is 15 seconds to prevent premature replication breaks due to transient network issues."

Module: Nutanix Cluster Check (NCC), Section: Metro Availability Alerts"An NCC warning indicating that the break_replication_timeout for a Metro Protection Domain is below the recommended minimum suggests the timeout is too low, risking unnecessary replication breaks. The recommended setting is 15 seconds to balance stability and responsiveness in Metro Availability setups."

Explanation of Options:

A. Update the break_replication_timeout to 10 secondsThis is incorrect. A timeout of 10 seconds is below the recommended minimum of 15 seconds, as specified in the ECA course. Setting the timeout too low increases the risk of replication breaking due to transient network latency or jitter, which could disrupt Metro Availability and cause unnecessary failovers. The ECA documentation warns:"A break_replication_timeout below 15 seconds may lead to frequent replication breaks, reducing the reliability of Metro Availability."

B. Update the break_replication_timeout to 5 millisecondsThis is incorrect. A timeout of 5 milliseconds is far too low and impractical for Metro Availability, as even minor network delays would trigger replication breaks. The ECA course does not support millisecond-level timeouts and explicitly recommends 15 seconds as the minimum. Such a low value would destabilize the Metro setup, as noted:"Extremely low timeout values are not supported, as they cause replication to break under normal network conditions."

C. Update the break_replication_timeout to 15 millisecondsThis is incorrect. A timeout of 15 milliseconds is still significantly below the recommended minimum of 15 seconds. Similar to option B, this setting would cause replication to break too quickly, undermining the purpose of Metro Availability. The ECA course clarifies:"Timeouts in milliseconds are not recommended for Metro Availability, as they do not account for typical network latency in synchronous replication setups."

D. Update the break_replication_timeout to 15 secondsThis is the correct answer. The ECA course explicitly recommends abreak_replication_timeoutof 15 seconds as the minimum to ensure Metro Availability remains stable. This value allows the system to tolerate transient network issues without prematurely breaking replication, maintaining data consistency and availability. The NCC warning indicates the current timeout is below this threshold, and updating it to 15 seconds resolves the issue.

Supporting Extract:"To resolve NCC warnings about break_replication_timeout, set the value to 15 seconds using the ncli command: ncli pd update-metro-avail-pd name= break_replication_timeout=15. This ensures compliance with Nutanix best practices."

Additional Context from ECA:

Metro Availability Overview: Metro Availability synchronously replicates data between two clusters, typically within 100 km, to achieve zero RPO. Thebreak_replication_timeoutis a critical parameter that balances responsiveness to network issues with the need to avoid unnecessary replication breaks. The ECA course notes:"A timeout of 15 seconds is the default and recommended value to handle typical network fluctuations in Metro setups."

NCC Warning Resolution: The NCC (Nutanix Cluster Check) monitors cluster health and flags configurations that deviate from best practices. The warning aboutbreak_replication_timeoutindicates a risk to Metro Availability stability, and setting it to 15 seconds aligns with Nutanix recommendations.

Supporting Reference from Web Results:

The Nutanix Support Portal (https://portal.nutanix.com) confirms the ECA guidance: "For Metro Availability, the break_replication_timeout should be set to a minimum of 15 seconds to prevent replication breaks due to transient network issues, as flagged by NCC warnings."

When synchronous replication fails immediately between two clusters, it is often due to blocked communication across the required ports (2009 and 2020). These must be open manually if the clusters are in different subnets or if network policies block traffic.

From theNutanix Enterprise Cloud Administration (ECA)course materials:

“Replication communication relies on specific ports, which must be allowed through the firewall. If the clusters are in different subnets or if there are external firewalls, these ports must be explicitly opened.”

“The modify_firewall command is used to open or close ports on cluster nodes. For replication and remote site communication, eth1 is typically used for external replication traffic.”

Since eth1 is typically used for external connectivity and replication traffic, opening ports on this interface using modify_firewall resolves the communication block.

Upgrading an AHV host with GPUs requires that the correct GPU drivers be manually uploaded to LCM, as GPU firmware is not updated automatically.

Option C (Use Direct Uploads to upload appropriate driver bundles) is correct:

LCM does notautomatically fetch GPU drivers.

The administrator mustdownload and manually upload the appropriate firmware bundlebefore upgrading.

Option A is incorrect:

Agent VMs are not requiredfor GPU updates.

Option B is incorrect:

Running LCM indark site mode does not impact GPU firmware updates.

Option D is incorrect:

Updating NCCis a best practice but does not resolve GPU driver issues.

Moving vDisks to a storage container with compression enabled ensures better data efficiency without downtime.

Option A (Migrate vDisks) is correct:

vDisk migration is non-disruptiveand allows compression settings to be applied dynamically.

Option B (Recreate the VM) is incorrect:

Rebuilding the VM is unnecessaryand would causedowntime.

Option C (Migrate the VM) is incorrect:

VM migration does not guarantee that only vDisks move, and it may disrupt performance.

Option D (Recreate vDisk) is incorrect:

This method ismanual and time-consuming, while Nutanix provides anautomated approach.

Data-in-Transit Encryption ensures that replication traffic is encrypted while being sent over the internet.

Option D (Enable Data-in-Transit Encryption) is correct:

This encryptsreplicated data between clusters, ensuring security againstman-in-the-middle attacks.

Option A (Self-encrypting drive) is incorrect:

This protects data at rest, not during transmission.

Option B (UEFI Secure Boot) is incorrect:

Secure Boot prevents unauthorized OS modifications, but doesnot encrypt network traffic.

Option C (Data-at-Rest Encryption) is incorrect:

This encryptsstored data but does not secure replication traffic.

Offset-based IP mapping in Nutanix Recovery Plans allows automatic subnet changes during DR failover.

Option D (Utilize Recovery Plan Offset-based IP mapping) is correct:

This methodautomatically adjusts the IP rangewhile keeping the same last octet.

It eliminates the need formanual interventionafter failover.

Option A (Custom script) is incorrect:

Scripting is an option, butRecovery Plan IP mapping is simpler and native to Nutanix.

Option B (Use IPAM) is incorrect:

IP Address Management (IPAM) is useful, butoffset-based mapping provides more control.

Option C (Manually update IPs) is incorrect:

This would betime-consuming and error-prone.

Storage Policies in Nutanix are applied through Categories, allowing policy-based automation and enforcement.

Option D (Assign the VM or VG to the same Category as the Storage Policy) is correct:

Nutanixapplies Storage Policies based on VM Categories, enablingflexibility in policy enforcement.

Option A is incorrect:

Storage Policies are not directly assigned at the VM or VG level—they apply through Categories.

Option B is incorrect:

Policies must be assigned toCategories, not directly to individual VMs/VGs.

Option C is incorrect:

Migrating to a storage container does not automatically apply a Storage Policy.

LCM (Life Cycle Manager) fetches software updates from Nutanix’s repositories, requiring access to specific URLs.

Option A (download.nutanix.com) is correct:

This domainhosts all software update filesfor AOS, AHV, and other Nutanix components.

Option C (release-api.nutanix.com) is correct:

This domain is used forLCM to fetch update metadataand check for new versions.

Option B (mynutanix.com) is incorrect:

This domain is used foraccount management, not LCM updates.

Option D (portal.nutanix.com) is incorrect:

TheNutanix support portal is not used for automated LCM updates.

For optimal Disaster Recovery performance, new nodes must match or exceed the storage performance of existing nodes.

Option A (New node must have at least 2 SSDs) is correct:

Since the G7 nodes havetwo SSDs, replacing G5 nodes withat least 2 SSDsensuresconsistent SSD cache and performance.

Option B is incorrect:

G7 or G8 nodes may help, but storage performance is more critical for DR.

Option C is incorrect:

CPU core count does not impact DR storage performance as much as SSD capacity.

Option D is incorrect:

Hybrid nodes are already in use, but SSDs must match for performance balance.

In Nutanix Prism Central,categoriesallow administrators togroup and organize entitiesfor management, automation, and policy enforcement.

Alerts (Option B) can be categorizedto group similar system events and create filtering rules.

Virtual Machines (Option C) can be categorizedto apply security policies, automation tasks, and resource allocation rules.

Option A (Storage Containers) cannot be categorizedin Prism Central. Storage policies apply at the container level but are not managed via categories.

Option D (ISO Images) cannot be categorizedbecause ISOs arestatic objects, not active entities.

The most efficient way to move a VM’s storage to a container that has different storage optimization policies (like compression) is to perform aVM migrationto the target container. This operation ensures that all the VM’s vDisks are moved to the destination container and allows leveraging the configured optimizations on the Production container.

From theNutanix Enterprise Cloud Administration (ECA)course materials:

“VM migration to another storage container in Nutanix Prism Central is supported and can be performed with minimal disruption. When moving a VM to a new container, it inherits the storage optimization policies of that container, including compression, deduplication, and encryption.”

Furthermore:

“Migrations can be initiated at the VM level in Prism Central or Prism Element. This is the most streamlined method to ensure all vDisks for a VM are moved together, preserving data integrity and performance characteristics.”

Recreating the VM or vDisks would be cumbersome and require manual data copying, introducing potential risks and downtime.

By default, Nutanix Prism Central retains the last 10 instances of a report if no retention policy is configured.

Option B (10) is correct:

Nutanixstores up to 10 reports, after which older reports areautomatically deleted.

Options A (5), C (15), and D (20) are incorrect:

Whileretention policies can be customized, thedefault setting is 10 reports.

Reserved Capacity settings define how much storage is exclusively allocated for a specific container.

Option B (Reserved Capacity is too high) is correct:

If too much space is reserved for a container, it can report "out of space" while the cluster still has free capacity.

Options A, C, and D are incorrect:

Advertised Capacity, Compression, and RF settings do not directly cause storage exhaustion unless misconfigured with Reserved Capacity.

When connectivity between Metro clusters is lost, Nutanix Metro Availability ensures data integrity using Witness for automatic failover.

Option A (Guest VM I/O operations pause until connectivity is restored) is correct:

Metro Availability enforces data consistency, so I/O operationspauseuntil failover is confirmed.

Option C (Guest VMs failover automatically to the recovery cluster) is correct:

TheWitness VM detects the failureand initiates anautomatic failoverto the secondary cluster.

Option B is incorrect:

Prism Centraldoes not control VM failover in Metro Availability.

Option D is incorrect:

The primary cluster isunreachable, so VMs cannot continue running there.

TheBully VMs Listview in Prism Central’sIntelligent Operationsidentifies VMs that are consumingexcessive resources(CPU, memory, or storage IO) and causing resource starvation for other VMs.

From theNutanix ECA documentation:

“Bully VMs List identifies virtual machines with high resource consumption, enabling administrators to investigate and take action to prevent performance degradation in other VMs.”

The other options:

A (Constrained VMs): Shows VMs that are being starved of resources.

C (Inactive VMs): Shows VMs that are using little to no resources.

D (Overprovisioned VMs): Shows VMs with allocated resources beyond actual usage.

When the maximum instance count of retained reports is reached, Nutanix automatically deletes the oldest report to accommodate the new one.

From theNutanix Enterprise Cloud Administration (ECA)course materials:

“To ensure storage and performance efficiency, Nutanix reporting limits the number of stored reports. If this maximum is reached, the oldest report instance is automatically deleted to make space for new reports.”

Understanding the Exhibit & Memory Allocation

Thehost has 128GB of physical RAM.

Thecurrent memory allocationacrossthree VMs (VM1, VM2, VM3) is 128GB, but only92GB is actually utilized.

This means there is36GB of unutilized memory available for allocation.

Step-by-Step Breakdown

Existing Memory Usage Before Adding VM4

Total Physical RAM:128GB

Used by running VMs (VM1, VM2, VM3):92GB

Unutilized Memory Available:36GB

After Creating and Running VM4

VM4 is allocatedmemory but only utilizes 28GB.

The table does not show VM4’s allocated RAM, but assuming it was given a reasonable allocation, it must have been taken from the36GB unutilized memory pool.

IfVM4 uses 28GB, theremaining unutilized memory is now (36GB - 28GB) = 8GB.

Maximum Memory Allocation for VM5

Sinceonly 8GB remains unutilized, the maximum memory VM5 can be allocated while still allowing it to power on is8GB.

Evaluating the Answer Choices

(A) 4GB❌(Incorrect)

More memory (8GB) is available, so limiting to 4GB is unnecessary.

(B) 8GB✅(Correct)

Theremaining unutilized memory after VM4 is 8GB, so VM5 can be allocated up to8GBwhile ensuring it can power on.

(C) 16GB❌(Incorrect)

Only8GB is left, so 16GB isnot possible.

(D) 32GB❌(Incorrect)

There isnot enough unutilized memoryto allocate 32GB.

Key Concept: Nutanix Memory Overcommit

Nutanix AHV supportsmemory overcommit, meaning VMs can be allocated more memory than physically available usingmemory ballooning and swapping.

However,to power on VM5 without impacting performance, it must fit within the available unutilized memory, which is8GB.

To ensureVM high availability (HA) in the event of a node failure, the administrator mustenable HA Reservation (Option B)in Prism Element.

High Availability (HA) in Nutanix ensures that VMs restart on another available node if the host they are running on fails.

Option A (Redundancy Factor 3)affectsstorage redundancy, not VM failover.

Option C (Protection Domains)is related todisaster recovery (DR), not local HA failover.

Option D (RF1 Storage Container)would reduce fault tolerance and is not recommended for production environments.

Nutanix requires thatall cluster components synchronize time using an external NTP (Network Time Protocol) server.

Option A (Adding an external NTP server) is correctbecause Nutanix best practices recommend using anexternal time source to prevent clock drift between cluster nodes.

Option B (DNS server IP) is incorrect: ADNS server does not provide NTP services.

Option C (Server with DNS hostname) is incorrectunless the DNS hostnameresolves to an NTP server.

Option D (IP of the Domain Controller) is incorrectbecausenot all domain controllers provide NTP servicesunless explicitly configured.