NCP-MCI-6.10 Nutanix Certified Professional - Multicloud Infrastructure (NCP-MCI v6.10) Free Practice Exam Questions (2025 Updated)

Understanding the Issue

The administrator is investigating VM performance complaints and is analyzing CPU Ready Time data.

CPU Ready Time is a crucial metric in Nutanix and virtualization environments (AHV, ESXi, or Hyper-V).

It measures the amount of time a VM is waiting for CPU scheduling due to resource contention.

High CPU Ready Time indicates that VMs are ready to run but are waiting because the host lacks available CPU resources.

Analysis of the Exhibit

The graph shows CPU Ready Time spikes for multiple VMs.

Some VMs have CPU Ready Time exceeding 18% to 21.5%, which is very high.

A healthy CPU Ready Time should be below 5%.

Values above 10% indicate CPU contention, and anything above 20% is critical and requires immediate troubleshooting.

Evaluating the Answer Choices

❌(A) Check the number of vCPUs assigned to each CVM. (Incorrect)

CVMs (Controller VMs) have fixed CPU allocation, and modifying their vCPU count is not recommended unless advised by Nutanix Support.

The issue is related to VM CPU contention, not CVM configuration.

✅(B) Review host CPU utilization. (Correct Answer)

High CPU Ready Time suggests CPU overcommitment or host saturation.

The administrator should check host CPU usage in Prism Central to determine if the cluster is overloaded.

If host CPU usage is consistently above 85–90%, VMs are competing for CPU resources, leading to high CPU Ready Time.

❌(C) Assess cluster SSD capacity. (Incorrect)

SSD capacity impacts storage performance (latency, read/write speeds) but does not affect CPU Ready Time.

High CPU Ready Time is a CPU scheduling issue, not a storage bottleneck.

❌(D) Enable VM memory oversubscription. (Incorrect)

Memory oversubscription does not impact CPU scheduling.

Enabling memory oversubscription affects RAM allocation, but CPU Ready Time is strictly related to CPU contention.

Next Steps to Diagnose & Resolve the Issue

Review Host CPU Utilization:

Navigate to Prism Central → Analysis → CPU Usage per Host.

Identify hosts experiencing high CPU load.

Check VM vCPU Allocation:

Ensure that VMs do not have excessive vCPUs assigned, which can lead to scheduling inefficiencies.

Overprovisioning vCPUs can cause unnecessary contention.

Balance Workload Across Hosts:

Use Nutanix AHV DRS (Dynamic Scheduling) or VMware DRS to redistribute VMs across hosts.

Check if certain hosts are overloaded while others have spare CPU capacity.

Consider Scaling Out the Cluster:

If CPU usage is consistently high, adding more nodes may be required to reduce CPU contention.

Multicloud Infrastructure References & Best Practices

CPU Ready Time Best Practices:

Keep CPU Ready Time below 5%.

Avoid overcommitting vCPUs on heavily loaded hosts.

Monitor Prism Central Runway Metrics to predict future CPU resource needs.

Nutanix AHV CPU Scheduling Optimization:

Ensure proper VM sizing (avoid excessive vCPU allocation).

Balance workloads using Nutanix AHV DRS.

The Nutanix Enterprise Cloud Administration (ECA) course provides detailed guidance on managing images in a multicloud environment, particularly when administering multiple clusters across different geographic sites via a single Prism Central instance. The goal of optimizing image uploads to all locations involves ensuring efficient image availability, minimizing latency, and balancing storage and network resource usage. The ECA course emphasizes the use ofImage Placement Policiesto control how images are distributed and stored across clusters registered with Prism Central.

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

Module: Image Management, Section: Image Placement Policies"Prism Central allows administrators to manage images centrally for multiple clusters. Image Placement Policies define how images are distributed to clusters. A policy with Soft Enforcement ensures that images are uploaded to a preferred cluster and replicated to other clusters as needed, optimizing for network efficiency and availability while allowing flexibility if a target cluster is unavailable."

Module: Prism Central Management, Section: Multi-Cluster Image Management"For environments with clusters at different geographic sites, an Image Placement Policy with Soft Enforcement is recommended to optimize image uploads. This policy allows Prism Central to select a primary cluster for image storage and replicate the image to other clusters based on demand, reducing unnecessary uploads while ensuring images are available where needed."

Explanation of Options:

A. Image Placement Policy with Soft EnforcementThis is the correct answer. The ECA course highlights that anImage Placement Policy with Soft Enforcementis designed to optimize image distribution in multi-cluster environments, especially across geographic sites. With Soft Enforcement, Prism Central uploads the image to a designated cluster (e.g., the closest or most available) and replicates it to other clusters as needed, based on workload requirements or VM deployment demands. This approach minimizes redundant uploads, reduces network congestion, and ensures images are available efficiently across sites. The "soft" aspect allows flexibility—if a target cluster is offline or has insufficient storage, Prism Central can select an alternative cluster, ensuring operational continuity.

Supporting Extract:"Soft Enforcement allows Prism Central to prioritize a primary cluster for image storage but permits fallback to other clusters if the primary is unavailable, optimizing upload efficiency and image availability across multiple sites."

B. Custom Image Upload RoleThis is incorrect. The ECA course does not define a "Custom Image Upload Role" as a feature in Prism Central for optimizing image uploads. While Prism Central supports role-based access control (RBAC) for managing permissions, including image management, these roles govern who can upload or manage images, not how images are distributed or optimized across clusters. The ECA materials state:"RBAC in Prism Central allows administrators to assign permissions for image management, but it does not influence the placement or optimization of image uploads."This option is irrelevant to the question’s focus on optimizing image distribution.

C. Bandwidth Throttling PolicyThis is incorrect. While bandwidth throttling can regulate network usage during data transfers (e.g., during replication or migration), it does not directly optimize image uploads for availability or efficiency across multiple clusters. The ECA course mentions bandwidth throttling in the context of data protection and replication:"Bandwidth Throttling Policies can be applied to replication schedules to manage network usage, but they are not used for image placement or upload optimization in Prism Central."Throttling could even slow down image distribution, counteracting the goal of optimization, especially in a multi-site scenario.

D. Image Placement Policy with Hard EnforcementThis is incorrect. AnImage Placement Policy with Hard Enforcementstrictly mandates that images be uploaded to specific clusters as defined in the policy. If the designated cluster is unavailable (e.g., due to network issues, storage constraints, or downtime), the upload fails, which can disrupt operations in a multi-site environment. The ECA course notes:"Hard Enforcement ensures images are only stored on specified clusters, but this can lead to upload failures if the target cluster is offline or lacks capacity, making it less suitable for geographically distributed environments."This rigidity makes Hard Enforcement less optimal compared to Soft Enforcement, which provides flexibility and ensures image availability.

Additional Context from ECA:

Image Management Workflow: The ECA course explains that Prism Central’s Image Service centralizes image management for all registered clusters. When an image is uploaded, the Image Placement Policy determines where it is stored and how it is replicated. For geographically dispersed clusters, Soft Enforcement balances efficiency and availability by prioritizing a primary cluster (e.g., based on proximity or storage capacity) while allowing replication to other clusters as needed for VM provisioning or workload deployment.

Extract:"In multi-site deployments, Soft Enforcement optimizes image uploads by reducing redundant data transfers and ensuring images are accessible across clusters without requiring manual intervention."

Practical Consideration: In a multi-site scenario, network latency and storage availability vary across clusters. Soft Enforcement allows Prism Central to adapt dynamically, ensuring images are uploaded to a viable cluster and replicated efficiently, which aligns with the goal of optimization.

Supporting Reference from Web Results:

The Nutanix Bible (https://www.nutanix.com/go/the-nutanix-bible) reinforces the ECA documentation: "Image Placement Policies in Prism Central streamline image management across clusters. Soft Enforcement is ideal for multi-site environments, as it allows flexible image placement and replication, ensuring efficient uploads and availability."This confirms that Soft Enforcement is the recommended approach for optimizing image uploads in a multi-cluster, multi-site setup.

Themost efficient wayto allow team leads to manage aspecific set of VMsis bycreating a Project (Option C)in Prism Central and assigning the team leads to that Project.

Nutanix Projects allow administrators to control VM accessbased on groups and permissions, ensuring that users only manage VMs assigned to their project.

Option A (Role Mapping)applies more broadly to roles but does not restrict access to specific VM groups.

Option B (VPC Admin)is related to network segmentation, not VM access control.

Option D (Security Policies)are used for network and firewall rules, not VM access control.

The Nutanix ECA course provides detailed procedures for performing hardware upgrades, such as adding host memory, to ensure cluster stability and data availability. Upgrading host memory requires safely preparing the node to avoid disrupting running VMs or cluster operations.

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

Module: Cluster Management, Section: Hardware Upgrades"Before performing hardware upgrades, such as adding host memory, the node must be placed into maintenance mode. This ensures that all VMs are migrated to other nodes and the host is safely isolated from cluster operations."

Module: Host Maintenance, Section: Maintenance Mode"Placing a node into maintenance mode is the first step for hardware upgrades. Maintenance mode migrates all VMs to other nodes, stops the Controller VM (CVM), and prepares the host for safe shutdown or hardware changes."

Explanation of Options:

A. Gracefully stop the host by using the out of band management interfaceThis is incorrect. Stopping the host via the out-of-band management interface (e.g., IPMI or iLO) without first entering maintenance mode risks disrupting running VMs and cluster services. The ECA course warns:"Shutting down a host without maintenance mode can cause VM crashes and data unavailability, as VMs are not migrated."

B. Remove node from the clusterThis is incorrect. Removing a node from the cluster is a permanent action that detaches it from the cluster’s metadata and storage pool, requiring re-imaging to rejoin. It is not appropriate for a temporary hardware upgrade like adding memory. The ECA course states:"Removing a node is not required for hardware upgrades and should be avoided, as it disrupts cluster configuration."

C. Execute "shutdown -h now" from the AHV command line interfaceThis is incorrect. Running shutdown -h now on the AHV host without entering maintenance mode will abruptly stop the host, potentially crashing VMs and disrupting cluster operations. The ECA course notes:"Directly shutting down a host via CLI without maintenance mode risks data loss and service disruption."

D. Place node into maintenance modeThis is the correct answer. Placing the node into maintenance mode is the first step for hardware upgrades, as it safely migrates all VMs to other nodes, stops the CVM, and prepares the host for shutdown or hardware changes. The ECA course emphasizes that maintenance mode ensures cluster stability during upgrades.

Supporting Extract:"To upgrade host memory, place the node into maintenance mode using Prism Element or the CLI command ncli host maintenance_mode. This ensures safe VM migration and host isolation."

Additional Context from ECA:

Maintenance Mode Process: In Prism Element, maintenance mode can be enabled underHardware > Host > Enter Maintenance Mode. The process automatically migrates VMs using live migration, stops the CVM, and isolates the host. For AHV, the CLI command is ncli host maintenance_mode id= enable=true.

Memory Upgrade: After entering maintenance mode, the host can be safely powered off to add memory, then powered back on and exited from maintenance mode.

Supporting Reference from Web Results:

The Nutanix Bible (https://www.nutanix.com/go/the-nutanix-bible) confirms: "Maintenance mode is the required first step for host hardware upgrades, ensuring VMs are migrated and the node is isolated before changes like memory upgrades."

The Nutanix ECA course covers the use of Playbooks in Prism Central to automate responses to specific events or conditions, such as VM protection failures. The task requires creating an alert for VMs in theCriticalApps:Alertscategory when a VM Protection Failed Alert is triggered, with notifications sent to on-call personnel.

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

Module: Automation, Section: Playbooks"Playbooks in Prism Central can be configured with an Alert Matching Criteria trigger to respond to specific alerts, such as VM protection failures. This trigger allows filtering by entity categories, ensuring the Playbook only acts on VMs matching the specified category, and can send notifications to designated personnel."

Module: Intelligent Operations, Section: Alert Management"To create an alert for specific VMs based on a category, use a Playbook with an Alert Matching Criteria trigger. This allows precise targeting of alerts (e.g., VM Protection Failed) for VMs in a category like CriticalApps:Alerts, with actions such as sending email notifications to on-call teams."

Explanation of Options:

A. Create a Playbook with a Manual triggerThis is incorrect. A Manual trigger requires an administrator to manually initiate the Playbook, which does not meet the requirement for automatic alerting when a VM Protection Failed Alert is triggered. The ECA course states:"Manual triggers are used for ad-hoc Playbook execution, not for automated responses to alerts."

B. Create a Playbook with an Alert Matching Criteria triggerThis is the correct answer. An Alert Matching Criteria trigger allows the Playbook to respond automatically to specific alerts, such as VM Protection Failed, and can be filtered to apply only to VMs in theCriticalApps:Alertscategory. The Playbook can then execute an action, such as sending an email notification to on-call personnel. The ECA course highlights this as the most precise method for alert-based automation.

Supporting Extract:"The Alert Matching Criteria trigger enables Playbooks to filter alerts by type and entity category, ensuring targeted responses, such as notifying on-call personnel for VM protection failures in specific categories."

C. Create a Playbook with an Event-based triggerThis is incorrect. Event-based triggers respond to system events (e.g., VM power-on or cluster events) rather than specific alerts like VM Protection Failed. They are less precise for this use case, as they do not allow filtering by alert type or category. The ECA course notes:"Event-based triggers are suited for general system events, not for targeted alert responses like VM protection failures."

D. Create a Playbook with an Alert-based triggerThis is incorrect. The term “Alert-based trigger” is not a standard option in Nutanix Playbooks. The correct terminology isAlert Matching Criteria trigger, which is specifically designed for alert-driven automation. The ECA course does not reference a generic “Alert-based trigger” option.

Additional Context from ECA:

Playbook Configuration: In Prism Central, a Playbook is created underOperations > Playbooks > Create Playbook. Select theAlert Matching Criteriatrigger, specify theVM Protection Failedalert, and filter by theCriticalApps:Alertscategory. Add an action to send an email notification to the on-call team.

Category Filtering: Categories (e.g., CriticalApps:Alerts) are key-value pairs assigned to VMs for organization and policy enforcement, making them ideal for targeting specific VMs in Playbooks.

Supporting Reference from Web Results:

The Nutanix Bible (https://www.nutanix.com/go/the-nutanix-bible) supports: "Playbooks with Alert Matching Criteria triggers allow precise automation for alerts, such as VM protection failures, filtered by VM categories, with actions like sending notifications."

In Nutanix Prism Central, if anadministrator is also an approverfor an approval policy, it can result in repeated prompts for approvals even after the original request is approved. This occurs because the system requires the approver (who is also the requester) to explicitly confirm actions involving protected snapshots to maintain compliance and avoid accidental deletion.

From theNutanix ECA documentation:

“When an administrator is configured as an approver in the approval policy, repeated approval requests may occur because the same user must explicitly confirm actions they initiated, such as deleting protected snapshots. This ensures administrative actions are fully deliberate.”

Nutanix storage containers allow administrators to configure capacity reservations and advertised limits for better resource management.

Option D (Set Reserved Capacity to 10 GiB and Advertised Capacity to 500 GiB) is correct:

Reserved Capacityensures that10 GiB is always available for this container and not consumed by other containers.

Advertised Capacitydefines alogical limit of 500 GiBto prevent over-allocation.

Option A is incorrect:

Advertised Capacity of 10 GiB is too lowand does not match the requirement of a500 GiB storage container.

Option B is incorrect:

Only setting Advertised Capacity does not guarantee Reserved Capacity, meaning other containers could consume the reserved space.

Option C is incorrect:

Setting only Reserved Capacity does not enforce an upper limit, which could lead to overprovisioning.

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.

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.

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.

Agent VMs, such as CVMs (Controller VMs) or Witness VMs, have strict affinity and anti-affinity rules to ensure they remain on specific hosts and maintain data consistency and high availability. If an agent VM is powered off and then manually started on another host, it becomes unresponsive because it breaks these rules.

From theNutanix Enterprise Cloud Administration (ECA)course materials:

“Agent VMs have specific configuration and affinity constraints. Manually starting them on another host violates these constraints, resulting in the agent VM becoming unresponsive to the cluster.”

Further clarification:

“The cluster expects the agent VM to be on a particular host. Moving it manually to another host breaks this expectation and causes the VM to be unable to properly join the cluster services, leading to an unresponsive state.”

Therefore, it is essential to avoid manually starting agent VMs on different hosts, as doing so can disrupt cluster services.

In Nutanix Prism Central, user-generated reports in Intelligent Operations are stored for a limited time and then deleted automatically.

Option C (Reports are automatically deleted after 24 hours) is correct:

Reportsdo not persist indefinitelyunless they arescheduled reports.

One-time reports expire after 24 hours.

Option A (Cluster Viewer deleted the report) is incorrect:

Cluster Viewerdoes not have permissions to delete reports.

Option B (Report was archived) is incorrect:

Nutanixdoes not automatically archive reports.

Option D (Report stored in Prism Element) is incorrect:

Reportsare generated and stored only in Prism Central, not Prism Element.

To automate the deployment of a large number of Linux VMs (such as 100), each with similar base configurations but unique hostnames, local configurations, and additional package installations,Cloud-Initis the most appropriate approach. Cloud-Init is a widely supported industry-standard tool for automating the initialization and configuration of Linux instances at first boot.

From theNutanix Enterprise Cloud Administration (ECA)course materials:

“Cloud-Init is the recommended method for configuring Linux virtual machines during deployment in Prism Central. It allows administrators to inject configuration scripts and user data that customize the VM at boot time, including hostname, network settings, user creation, and package installations.”

Specifically:

“Using Cloud-Init, you can create a template or base image for the Linux VMs and then customize each VM deployment by passing individualized configuration parameters, ensuring that while the base configuration remains consistent, each VM has unique settings such as hostname or installed software.”

This method is far superior to manual configuration, which is impractical for 100 VMs, and it’s not suitable to use SysPrep (which is for Windows-based customization). VM templates alone would provide only the base image; they do not address unique per-VM settings.

Therefore,Cloud-Initensures a repeatable, scalable, and fully automated deployment process that aligns with the Nutanix best practices for deploying large numbers of Linux VMs with unique configurations.

For Disaster Recovery to function correctly, the source and destination storage containers must have identical names.

Option C (Storage container name mismatch) is correct:

If thestorage container name at the DR site does not match, Nutanix cannot mapsnapshots and replication data.

This causesfailover operations to fail, even though data exists.

Option A (NGT not installed) is incorrect:

NGT is needed for application-consistent snapshots, butnot required for crash-consistent snapshots.

Option B (Windows updates) is incorrect:

OS updates do not affect replication availability.

Option D (Storage RF factor mismatch) is incorrect:

Replication works across different RF factors, but performance may vary.