Azure: Cannot Configure a VM Size beyond A0-A4 - azure

I am attempting to increase the size of a Virtual Machine on my Azure subscription from an A2 (2 cores, 3.5GB) machine to a D3 (4 cores, 14GB) machine. The only options available for this particular VM on the configure tab > Virtual machine size are:
- A0
- A1
- A2
- A3
- A4
I do not see an A5 or a D3 virtual machine size available - although these are available for other virtual machines within my subscription. We have had this and a couple of other VMs with the same issue running for about a year and a half - the newer VMs in our subscription (as well as machines in the create gallery) can all be scaled into the memory and CPU intensive versions (A5 or D3, D4).
Is there any pathway that will allow me to upgrade this older VM to a newer specification of Virtual Machine?

According to the Azure MSDN article "Virtual Machine and Cloud Service Sizes for Azure" at:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/azure/dn197896.aspx
You can't increase the size of a "Basic Tier" VM to larger than A4. So, it looks like you will need to use the "Standard Tier" instead.
If the option to switch to the "Standard Tier" is not available for this VM, the explanation may be that VMs created before "April 16, 2013" may not be able to be upgraded to larger than A4 because of the older datacenter in which they reside. The article includes an explanation of this issue and link to a troubleshooting guide for workarounds for the "Error: “Failed to configure virtual machine” with A5, A6 or A7 VM size" at:
https://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/azure/en-US/9693f56c-fcd3-4d42-850e-5e3b56c7d6be/error-failed-to-configure-virtual-machine-with-a5-a6-or-a7-vm-size?forum=WAVirtualMachinesforWindows

This blog article visualizes changeable VM sizes in tables. Note that the blog information could be old, but it shows that there are VM sizes not changeable even though it is selectable on the list.
From the blog, below table gives an answer.
Note that above one is "ASM" while below is "ARM".
Changing VM size is strongly (or we can say definitely) depended on the Azure infrastructure, so the only way to resolve the issue is just to create new VM.

Related

What is the smallest vm available in azure?

I'm interested in creating a VM in Azure and downloading to my own machine to use in Hyper-V. The past couple of attempts at creating a VM have resulted in a 127Gb image. Can anyone tell me what the absolute smallest windows vm available is and how I can choose this in set up. There doesn't seem to be any options for anything smaller than this.
You can use windows vms labeled as smalldisk, those will have 30gb os disk size. any linux vm will have 30gb os disk by default.
if using non portal, you can specify os disk size, I didnt ever try to downsize it below 30, but cant imagine why it wont work (unless there isn't enough space on the disk).
Azure recently announced new B-series VM size, B1ls, which has the smallest memory and lowest cost among Azure VM instances. This offering is in response to customers who were looking for entry-level offerings. B1ls has 512 MiB of memory and 1 vCPU, and it costs only $0.0052 (US East) per hour.
B1ls is available only on Linux.
Reference: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/b-series-update-b1ls-is-now-available/

How to create Virtual Machine in Azure Free Services without cost

Azure says here that
750 Hours of B1S VM and 64 GB X 2 Managed Disks, 2 P6 SDDs
and some others are free each month for 12 months.
On VM create in Azure Portal, There are Basics, Disks and other tabs, In Basics, I could able to select Image Size to B1S VM but in Disks tab, there is no option to select Managed Disk of 64GB of P6 SDDs.
There are only three options i.e Premium SSD, Standard SSD, Standard HDD. Whatever I select and proceed further, VM takes default of 128 GB C Drive and 4 GB of Temp Drive and starts billing.
Where can I select that free 64 GB X 2 Managed Disks, 2 P6 SDDs.?
Just hover mouse over "create" in the virtual machines tab in menu. That will show a "free VM" option. Click that and it configures everything required for a free VM.
In Azure Portal use the search square box (on top) and look for "Free Services" then you will be able to use free VM and other services.
I don't think you can change disk os disk size at all (only increase it), but there are Windows images called smalldisk; those have 30gb disk. You can use those, they should work just fine.
After making the VM, open the resource group of the vm. Click the disk of the vm (Be sure that the VM is to be switched off, else it won't work) and select the disk. Open the disk and on the sidebar click size and performance and resize the disk to p6.
I think VM creation is not completely free. You have to pay for computing power and disk. Please response if I am wrong.

Cannot Deploy Service Fabric Cluster in Portal

I have tried several times, on several subscriptions using a couple of different accounts and I keep running into the same exact issue when attempting to deploy a new service fabric cluster through the Azure portal. I tried this with both secure and unsecure clusters (to ensure that my certificate setup was not to blame) as well as with 5 node clusters as well as single node test clusters. In all cases the error was exactly the same.
At step 4, in all cases, the portal indicates that the portal generated ARM template is valid, and allows me to start the deployment process. After about 10 minutes I get the dreaded Deployment Failed icon on my dashboard for the 20th time!
Clicking on the icon takes me to the error logs which indicate that there was an issue with "Write Deployments"
I also see that all the necessary resource types have been generated (Storage Accounts, VM ScaleSets, Etc..)
However looking at the VM Scale Set I see another (more descriptive) issue stating that there was a provisioning error with the code "ProvisioningState/failed/InternalDiskManagementError" and that an internal disk management error occurred.
I am at a complete loss. I am not doing anything custom, this is all on the Azure Portal and as I mentioned I tried both simple test clusters without security or logging as well as 5 node clusters with security and logging enabled. In all case I get the same exact error. This is on 3 different Azure accounts.
The only other thing that I might try is different regions (I've only been targeting West US 2) and maybe some variants on the VM size (been targeting A0 for cost).
Has anyone else run into similar issues? I've been able to deploy clusters before (a few months back) but ever since then I keep getting stopped by this bug!
UPDATE 1
I attempted a deployment in West US 2 using the A1_V2 VM Size and I again got the Write Deployment failure, but this time on the VM Scale Set I have a different error:
ProvisioningState/failed/VMExtensionHandlerNonTransientError
Handler 'Microsoft.Azure.Diagnostics.IaaSDiagnostics' has reported failure for VM Extension 'VMDiagnosticsVmExt_vmNodeType0Name' with terminal error code '1007' and error message: 'Install failed for plugin (name: Microsoft.Azure.Diagnostics.IaaSDiagnostics, version 1.10.0.0) with exception Command C:\Packages\Plugins\Microsoft.Azure.Diagnostics.IaaSDiagnostics\1.10.0.0\DiagnosticsInstall.cmd of Microsoft.Azure.Diagnostics.IaaSDiagnostics has not exited on time! Killing it...'
UPDATE 2
I made a deployment in Central US using a D sized VM and was able to deploy just fine. At this point it seems that either the Region or the VM Size is what is causing issues. Going to make a few more deployments using various VM sizes and regions and will continue updating here with my findings...
UPDATE 3
Was able to create a single node Standard_D1_v2 cluster in West US 2.
UPDATE 4
Was able to create a 3 node Standard_A2_v2 cluster in West US 2.
Region is not the issue.....
UPDATE 5
A second attempt at deploying A1_V2 VM in West US 2 resulted in the same error as the last time this VM size was used:
ProvisioningState/failed/VMExtensionHandlerNonTransientError
FINAL UPDATE
The issue seems to be that the VM's I was using are under-powered.
I hope that Microsoft updates their portal so the next developer does not run into the same issues as me. Right now the portal makes you think that your setup is valid (even passes the validation in step 4) and then fails without any clarity. I opened a support ticket and even the Azure techs are giving me the run around and having me check my Resource Provider settings! They have no clue that I'm using insufficient VM sizes!
I also think it's way too expensive for developers to have to pay so much just to get some test nodes up on the cloud. And I'm still perplexed that I was able to get a 5 node A0 cluster up an running, but no longer can! Maybe there was a Service Fabric software update since then?
The recommended VM SKU is Standard D3 or Standard D3_V2 or equivalent with a minimum of 14 GB of local SSD.
The minimum supported use VM SKU is Standard D1 or Standard D1_V2 or equivalent with a minimum of 14 GB of local SSD.
Partial core VM SKUs like Standard A0 are not supported for production workloads.
Standard A1 SKU is not supported for production workloads for performance reasons.
Source
These errors are usually caused by using unsupported VM sizes. As a workaround for test clusters, you can first deploy using something like D3_V2 and after successful deployment, scale down.

Ftp server on azure

I'm want to build a FTP server on Microsoft Azure platform.
The server probably will be based on vsftpd (linux ubuntu server) - not closed. Can select another free ftp service.
I'm have two issues:
End-points - If I'm using Passive mode, I'm need to allocate port range for this. Let's say 8000 to 8100. BUT, I'm have a option to allocate only 20 ports in the "End-points" interface.
I'm need to allocate at least one terabyte of storage in this server. How it's could be done with the machine?
Thank you!
There are a lot of articles written on the subject. Whereas one of the most recent is here.
Fr Virtual Machines, the limit of InputEndpoints is actually 150. Refer to the latest Azure limits compilation here.
As for 1T storage - check the VM sizes for Azure Virtual Mchines. Where A0 (the smallest) supports max 1 data disk of 1TB, and A4, A7 support 16 disks 1TB each (so total of 16TB per VM of size A4 or A7).
As for "built-in" endpoints - you can freely and surely remove them. Especially when you do not use them.

How can I add memory to an Azure virtual machine?

Is it possible to add a "custom" size memory to an Azure virtual machine?
For example, I'm using the Medium size - 2 core, 4GB RAM, I would like to have 8GB RAM with the current settings I have... otherwise the next option available is A5 2 core with 14GB.
At https://portal.azure.com/ you can select the machine, then go to Size and pick another size for your virtual machine. It currently looks a bit like this:
If you scroll down see you a lot of different configurations, but you can't customize parameters of any of the given configurations.
See also How to: Change the Size of a Windows Azure Virtual Machine at MSDN.
Simple answer is you can't. You will need to pick up from one of the existing VM sizes.
Looks like Microsoft recently added a Large (A3) machine with 7GB
http://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/details/virtual-machines/

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