Nutanix Files is a software-defined, scale-out file storage solution with inherent high-availability. File services contribute to important business functions in enterprises (VDI / Home Directories / Legal etc.), which is why Nutanix Files offers transparent HA for the Files Cluster VMs (FSVMs).

When one or more FSVM(s) are unable to serve their file-shares for various reasons, another FSVM will perform a 'takeover' operation to assume the degraded FSVM's External IP address and shares/exports.

During an HA event, the External IP is removed from the degraded FSVM and all shares exported. The FSVM taking over will then import the shares / exports and be assigned the other FSVMs external IP on a sub-interface of it's own External network. 

This allows the operation to be transparent to the client and prevents any configuration change by the customer before, during, or after the HA events.

Nutanix Files offers both SMB shares and NFS exports, both protocols behave differently in failure scenarios from a client perspective. 

To know more about the FSVM (FILES VM) HA scenarios for SMB and NFS Protocols, please visit the following Nutanix KB document: 

Nutanix Files - File server VM HA Expected Behaviour