Windows Azure IaaS is Live

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Windows Azure Infrastructure Services, Virtual Machines and Virtual Network are now generally available (GA)! With this announcement these new services make it possible for you to move your applications into the cloud as is.  

This announcement also comes with a commitment to match Amazon Web Services prices for commodity services such as compute, storage and bandwidth. This starts with reducing the GA prices on Virtual Machines and Cloud Services by 21-33%.

New For GA:

  • 2 new high-memory compute instances: 28 GB, 4 cores & 56 GB, 8 cores to meet the needs of workloads such as SharePoint Server and SQL Server (available in 6 preview regions initially [East US, West US, North Europe, West Europe, East Asia, South East Asia ], expanded over time). 
  • SLAs in effect: SLA for Virtual Machines (multiple instances deployed in availability sets) and SLA for Virtual Network effective April 16, 2013.
  • Support for Virtual Machines and Virtual Network has been expanded to include not only the community forums but also Premier support as well.
  • Effective June 1, 2013, Windows Virtual Machines GA prices are reduced by 22% for standard instances (compared to previously announced GA prices): For a small standard instance, the new discounted GA price will be $0.09 per hour. That means standard Windows Virtual Machines instances retain preview prices until May 31, 2013. 
  • 29% price reduction on standard instances running Linux (compared to previously announced GA prices): Effective April 16, 2013, small instance priced at $0.06/hr.
  • New pre-built images with hourly rates in Virtual Machines Image Gallery: Get direct support from Microsoft. Starting with BizTalk Server and SQL Server; more images are coming soon. An evaluation version of SharePoint 2013 is also in the gallery!
  • Validation for most popular MSFT workloads on Virtual Machines: Bring your own licenses with SA License Mobility rights, plus get direct customer support from Microsoft - System Center Ops Manager 2012 SP1, Project Server 2013, SharePoint Server 2013 & 2010, Dynamics NAV 2013, and SQL Server 2012. Find the ultimate list here. 

If you visit the Infrastructure Services page you'll find some great videos on scenarios in which you can take advantage of Windows Azure Infrastructure Service. Not to mention ScottGu’s latest blog post.

Get going with a free trial at www.windowsazure.com today!