I see there are some limitations on Azure:
1. On number of disks to be attached to VM;
2. The size of each disk/storage blob is limited by 1TB;
Is there any hack or workaround to attach larger disks/several disks to the same VM without increasing the processing power of VM as my application doesn't need high computing capacities, but needs plenty of space.
May be it's possible by contacting their billing department?
Currently I'm using A1 Standard VM instance with 2 disks (2 TB it total) attached to it already. The goal is to attach 5 TB total disk space to the same VM without upgrading the VM size to a larger instance.
You will need to change your VM size to attach more disks. One option is to look at Basic tier instead of using Standard tier A Series VMs to optimize your cost. Since you do not need a lot of computing power, basic tier VMs may work fine for you. You will want to look at Basic A3 which will allow you to attach 8 maximum data disks of 1 TB each. See more information here (https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/virtual-machines-size-specs/)
Thanks,
Aung
I found a solution to attach 5TB folders as Azure File Sharing service.
It's possible via creating File Sharing containers through Azure Portal, then mounting the folder under Linux via CIFS (SMB3.0).
For those who are interested, there is an issue with mounting Windows File Sharing folders within CentOS 6.X under Azure. It works only with CentOS 7.X (keep it in mind).
You can use Storage Spaces in Azure to increment capacity and performance. The limit of the VHD is 1 TB per disk, using Storage Spaces you can pass this limitation. You need to have in mind that there is a limitation of disk to attach to the VM based on type you choose.
Sample explanation on:
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/dfurman/2014/04/27/using-storage-spaces-on-an-azure-vm-cluster-for-sql-server-storage/
Related
I have a scenario in which I need to fail over SQL server that is on-premises with disks larger than 2 TB. I know ASR does not support that. So, I am trying to find out if I could possibly do a workaround by striping the disks etc.
For ex: I could do a striping of disks on the on-prem machine and then do a failover. However that would require me to pull the machine off line which I cannot afford to.
So, please let me know of a possible workaround or if there is a feature in ASR that I am not aware of.
Thanks in advance
You could use either Dynamic disks or Storage Spaces to create a scenario where you replicate a volume of over 1023GB in size. The only problem is, the single disk cannot be larger than 1023GB and you would have to honor the maximum capacity of the VM (the VM's in Azure are limited by the amount of data disks you can attach).
If I setup a server running my application on an azure instance, for example A1 can I later change the instance to D2?
I might want to experiment with a VM at a lower cost but then move to a higher performing machine at a later date without having to rebuild everything.
Yes, you can change the size of Azure VM on demand. Changing the size will trigger a machine reboot and if you're using a configuration with SSD temporary drive, the content of the SSD will get erased. Other than that, everything else will be left untouched.
Drew, the Principal PM in this area has a great blog here about this.
You can only resize a VM to another offering that does not have fundamentally different hardware. Since A-Series and D-Series VMs have similar hardware, you would be able to swap those two around. You would not be able to go from A-Series to G-Series though. In addition you need to look at VM availability per region if you want to swap to something only in certain areas, as well as look at if you are using an ASM or ARM VM.
If you have an existing VM, you can check what it can swap out with in the new portal under "Size" in the VM Settings.
This will allow you to reboot into a different machine type, however any temp storage will be erased as with any VM reboot. You just need to ensure you are storing your persistent data in external storage.
You can learn more about the VM size offerings here.
I'm installing OSISoft on a single windows 2008 VM in Azure and part of the instructions recommends having 4 drives for each application. However Azure will only allow 2 disks be attached to a VM. What alternatives do I have?
You need to use data disks and choose the different VM size - the VM size determines the amount of data disks that can be connected.
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/virtual-machines-windows-sizes/
Tutorial:
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/virtual-machines-windows-classic-attach-disk/
I'm using Azure Virtual Machines, specifically Linux. I went to add a blank disk ("attach...blank disk" in the portal) and discovered that Azure only allows a maximum size of 1023GB for disks. The portal won't allow you to specify a size beyond 1023GB.
What I'm looking for is a 4TB filesystem. The disks present themselves as /dev/xd?. I'm wondering if I could take four 1TB disks and stripe them (RAID 0) in the OS? If they're SAN disks then I'm not concerned about the redundancy since presumably they're already protected. I admit it sounds kind of hokey.
Is there another option to get bigger disks in Azure?
To be clear, I want persistent storage, not the ephemeral /mnt/storage.
You are correct. You need 4 disks in Raid0 to get 4TB of data. You can follow the guide below; just make sure to change parameters accordingly because the guide uses 3 disks only.
Configure Software RAID on Linux
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/virtual-machines-linux-configure-raid/
Regarding redundancy, no matter what kind of storage you configured in Azure, the worst you can get is 3 mirrors for each disk so just go for full performance.
Azure Storage Replication
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/storage-redundancy/
For Windows you may use Storage Spaces
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/dfurman/archive/2014/04/27/using-storage-spaces-on-an-azure-vm-cluster-for-sql-server-storage.aspx
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh831739.aspx
I dont know if this is the right place, but I am assuming MSFT staff also answers these questions since the azure portal links to StackOverflow?
Questions:
I understand that Azure no longer bills me for a VM so long as it and its cloud service are stopped. But what is unclear is am I going to be billed for the Cloud Service itself? For example say i create a Virtual machine and by doing so i get a cloud service for it (with ip). Then I turn off that virtual Machine and the cloud service. Do i still get billed for the cloud service even though everything is turned off?
Continuing on the question above. Do i get billed storage fees for the Virtual Machines filesystem. Currently windows vms are around 120GB in size. How does the billing work out for virtual machines? And how does it change if the machine is turned off.
How are Custom Images billed? Say i create my Windows 2012 Master image with IIS and a few other components installed. Then I create my own Image so that I can bring up vms more rapidly. Where is the VM image stored? Will it be in my blob container under VHD's? And again will microsoft charge me to store this image? Will it be the full 120+ GB or the actual size of the image stored.
Sorry to ask these questions. Tried my best to google around and all i could find was a post by Scott Gu where he stated VMs wont be billed and very little detail beyond that.
I understand that Azure no longer bills me for a VM so long as it and
its cloud service are stopped. But what is unclear is am I going to be
billed for the Cloud Service itself? For example say i create a
Virtual machine and by doing so i get a cloud service for it (with
ip). Then I turn off that virtual Machine and the cloud service. Do i
still get billed for the cloud service even though everything is
turned off?
Essentially think of a cloud service as a shell under which you deploy a VM. Among other things, a cloud service provides you with a DNS (yourcloudservice.cloudapp.net for example). What you get charged for is the VM and not the cloud service so if you have nothing deployed in a cloud service, you don't get charged anything.
Continuing on the question above. Do i get billed storage fees for the
Virtual Machines filesystem. Currently windows vms are around 120GB in
size. How does the billing work out for virtual machines? And how does
it change if the machine is turned off.
Yes, I believe so. You would be charged for 120 GB of storage (based on this blog post: http://blogs.msdn.com/b/sql_shep/archive/2013/06/10/azure-billing-per-minute-and-no-compute-charge-for-a-stopped-iaas-vm.aspx) [See my note on pricing below].
How are Custom Images billed? Say i create my Windows 2012 Master
image with IIS and a few other components installed. Then I create my
own Image so that I can bring up vms more rapidly. Where is the VM
image stored? Will it be in my blob container under VHD's? And again
will microsoft charge me to store this image? Will it be the full 120+
GB or the actual size of the image stored.
Custom images are billed in a similar way as standard images as in both cases the VHD file is stored in your blob storage account so Microsoft will charge you for storage. Since VHDs are essentially saved as page blobs and page blobs are only charged based on the bytes occupied you will only be charged for the space you consumed.
UPDATE
VHD Pricing: Essentially VHDs are stored in blob storage as page blobs and the pricing of page blobs is calculated a little bit differently. For page blobs, you're only charged for the bytes you used instead of total blob size. So for example, you have a VHD of 120 GB size (i.e. your page blob size is 120 GB) but you're only occupying 30 GB there, you're only charged for 30 GB and not 120 GB.
As #Gaurav stated, you're not charged for the service container, only for running vm's. In the case of stopped VM's, you won't be charged, although you lose your assigned IP address if you have no other running vm's. You can choose to keep a vm provisioned to preserve IP address but then you'll continue paying for the VM. When a VM is stopped, you'll still pay for its storage (since these are persistent virtual machines).
Regarding storage costs: While the vhd might be a 120GB disk, you only pay for storage that's been actually used. That is, the page blob uses sparse allocation. If you format a 120GB volume but only use 30gb, you're billed for 30gb monthly, not 120gb. You pay for all vhd's, including your custom images, since each is stored in your storage account. Again, you don't pay for 120gb on your custom images; just for the allocated pages.
I don't think you get charged for the OS disk. If you have a data disk then you will be charged for the space used.