What is the difference between a health check and an alert in Nutanix?

Health checks are scheduled tests (powered by NCC) that return pass/warn/fail status, while alerts are event-driven notifications raised with a severity when something crosses a threshold or fails.

What does NCC do in Nutanix?

The Nutanix Cluster Check (NCC) runs health checks across the cluster to validate configuration, performance, and operation, and powers the Health dashboard results.

What is Pulse in Nutanix?

Pulse sends cluster telemetry to Nutanix Support for proactive monitoring, which speeds up case resolution and surfaces issues before they escalate.

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NCA 6.10 Study Guide · Section 3 of 4

Maintain Environmental Health

This section is "where do I look, and how do I check status." Know the health dashboard, the difference between an alert and a check, what NCC and Pulse each do, and the role of the Support Portal. Maps to Module 4 (Prism) and Module 2.

🎯 Section 3 of 4 Maps to Modules 2, 4 Versions AOS 6.10 · pc2024.2

3.1The Health dashboard and alerts

Prism has a Health dashboard that shows the status of hosts, disks, VMs, storage, and the cluster's data-resiliency state in one place. Two related but distinct concepts:

Concept	What it is
Health checks	Scheduled tests of configuration, performance, and operation (powered by NCC, §3.2). They run on a schedule and surface pass/warn/fail status.
Alerts	Event-driven notifications raised when something crosses a threshold or fails. Alerts have severities (info / warning / critical) and can email or notify out.

Exam shape

Checks are scheduled/proactive; alerts are event-driven/reactive. "Where do you see overall cluster status and resiliency at a glance?" → the Health dashboard in Prism.

3.2NCC, Nutanix Cluster Check

NCC (Nutanix Cluster Check) is the health-check framework. It runs a large battery of tests across the cluster's components, configuration, performance, and operational state and reports issues so you can fix them before they become outages. You can run NCC from Prism or the CLI (for example ncc health_checks run_all), and NCC is downloaded/updated from the Support Portal.

Pulse is packaged with NCC. That is why "always-on" telemetry works regardless of AOS or hypervisor version, NCC carries the latest checks and the Pulse mechanism.

3.3Pulse telemetry

Pulse is Nutanix's proactive support feature. When enabled, it securely sends cluster health and configuration data to Nutanix on a regular schedule. That data feeds Nutanix's Insights platform for predictive health and faster, context-aware support, and it can let support open or speed up cases proactively.

Exam shape

"Which feature automatically sends diagnostic/telemetry data to Nutanix for proactive support?" → Pulse. Pulse is scheduled telemetry; alerts are event-driven. Both can drive proactive support, but they are different mechanisms.

3.4The Support Portal

The Nutanix Support Portal (portal.nutanix.com) is where you download software (AOS, NCC, Foundation, LCM dark-site bundles), manage licenses, open and track support cases, and read documentation and KB articles. Pulse data surfaces in the portal's Insights views to help triage.

§Section 3 in one breath

Look at the Health dashboard for status. NCC runs the scheduled checks; alerts fire on events. Pulse (packaged with NCC) ships telemetry to Nutanix for proactive support, surfaced in the Support Portal / Insights.

§Self check

1. Alert vs health check: which is scheduled and which is event-driven?

2. What does NCC do, and where do you get it?

3. Which feature sends cluster data to Nutanix for proactive support, and what carries it?

4. Name three things you do on the Support Portal.