Unlocking the Power of Azure B-Series Virtual Machines

Azure B-Series Virtual Machines offer a new pricing model that's based on actual usage, rather than upfront commitments. This can help you save money on underutilized resources.

With Azure B-Series, you only pay for the CPU time your VM uses, which can be a significant cost savings for workloads that experience variable usage patterns.

Azure B-Series is a great option for dev/test environments, where resources are typically underutilized. This pricing model can help you keep costs down and be more agile in your development and testing processes.

If your workloads can run on smaller instances and don’t require lots of memory, then B-series might be your best bet.

The smallest B-series instance is Standard_B1ls, with 1 virtual CPU (vCPU) and 4GiB of memory.

All the smaller sizes, from Standard_B1ls to Standard_B1ms, have 1 vCPU with memory specs from 0.5 GiB to 2 GiB.

Once you get to Standard_B2ms, it’s the same as Standard_D2_v3, with 2 vCPUs and 8 GiB of memory.

To take full advantage of B-series, consider starting with the smallest instance that meets your needs and scaling up as necessary.

Azure B Series virtual machines are a cost-effective option for running a broad spectrum of general-purpose workloads.

These virtual machines run on AMD's third Generation EPYC 7763v processor in a multi-threaded configuration, offering a balance of compute, memory, and network resources.

You can choose from virtual machines with up to 32 vCPUs and 128 GiB of RAM, making them suitable for large scale micro-services, small and medium databases, virtual desktops, and business-critical applications.

Some smaller B-series virtual machines include the B1ls, B1s, B1ms, B2s, B2ms, and B4s, each with varying numbers of vCPUs, RAM, and IOPS.

Here's a breakdown of the smaller B-series virtual machines and their prices:

The Basv2-Series virtual machines are a great option for running general-purpose workloads on Azure. They utilize a CPU credit model to track CPU consumption, allowing for cost-effective burstable performance.

These virtual machines are powered by AMD's third Generation EPYC 7763v processor, offering up to 256 MB of L3 cache configuration in a multi-threaded configuration. They provide a balance of compute, memory, and network resources, making them suitable for a broad spectrum of workloads, including micro-services, small and medium databases, virtual desktops, and business-critical applications.

You can choose from virtual machines with up to 32 vCPUs and 128 GiB of RAM, with a maximum network bandwidth of up to 6,250 Mbps and maximum uncached disk throughput of 600 Mbps.

Here are the specs for Basv2-Series virtual machines:

You can attach Standard SSD, Standard HDD, Premium SSD disk types, or Ultra Disk storage, with disk storage billed separately from virtual machines.

The Bpsv2-Series is a great choice for Azure B Series, offering a range of benefits.

Each Bpsv2-Series VM is built on the latest AMD EPYC 7003 series processor, providing a significant boost in performance and efficiency.

These VMs support up to 128 vCPUs and 4 TB of memory, making them ideal for demanding workloads.

Bpsv2-Series VMs also offer improved security features, including support for AMD Secure Encrypted Virtualization (SEV).

With up to 32 GB of memory per vCPU, Bpsv2-Series VMs provide a flexible and scalable solution for your business needs.

The Bpsv2-Series is also available in several regions worldwide, making it easy to deploy and manage your Azure resources.

Optimizing small virtual machines is crucial for efficient resource usage. You can achieve this by using SSD disks, which are more stable and reliable than regular HDDs.

Creating a swap file is also essential, as it prevents your VM from becoming unresponsive if it runs out of memory. This can happen even with enough disk space available.

Static content, such as images and scripts, can be stored on Azure blob storage to reduce the load on your VM.

Using Network Security group rules can help limit access to your VM from specific IP addresses, preventing malicious scripts from consuming resources.

You can also disable the OMS agent if it's consuming too many resources, but only do so if you really need to.

Here's a quick rundown of some key settings to consider:

B-series VMs are not ideal for public web servers and reverse proxies due to malicious activity. However, they can be used for internal applications or behind a reverse proxy.

Implementing a robust security posture is crucial, and Azure B provides a secure way to store and manage credentials with features like Just-In-Time (JIT) access and conditional access.

Always use least privilege access to minimize the attack surface and ensure that only necessary permissions are granted.

Regularly review and update access controls to ensure they align with changing business needs and minimize the risk of stale or unnecessary permissions.

To scale your application on Azure B-series virtual machines, consider upgrading to a larger VM size, which offers more resources with only a small increase in expenses.

You can also explore Azure Dedicated Hosts, which provide physical servers able to host one or more virtual machines assigned to one Azure subscription.

Azure compute units (ACU) are a great way to compare compute performance across Azure SKUs, helping you make informed decisions about your application's infrastructure.

Monitoring Azure virtual machines is crucial to ensure they're running smoothly and efficiently, so be sure to check out the resources available on this topic.

Dv3-series VMs are perfect for workloads with consistent behavior, with a balance of CPU, RAM, and storage.

For a normal application server workload, Dv3-series is often the best choice, and many companies run their production applications on it.

Dv3-series makes it easier to see if one of the three is maxing out and holding your application back.

B-series VMs, on the other hand, are ideal for applications that are CPU-intensive in short bursts, as opposed to needing 100% CPU utilization all the time.

Continuous integration servers or build servers are good candidates for B-series VMs, with lots of short bursts while a build is going on but are idle the rest of the time.

Virtual desktop applications or line-of-business applications are also suitable for B-series VMs, with longer bursts during business hours with not much going on during evenings and weekends.

Video transcoding, with high CPU usage all the time, is a bad fit for B-series VMs, needing the full-time high performance of D-series VMs instead.

Credit monitoring is a crucial aspect of managing your Azure B-series resources. To monitor B-series specific credit metrics, you can utilize the Azure monitor data platform.

You can access Azure monitor data platform via the Azure portal, other orchestration paths, or programmatic API calls to Azure monitor. This will give you real-time access to metrics such as 'CPU Credits Consumed' and 'CPU Credits Remaining' for your given B-series size.

Monitoring these metrics will help you stay on top of your resource usage and prevent unexpected costs. You can also track 'Percentage CPU' to ensure your resources are running efficiently.

By keeping a close eye on these metrics, you'll be able to make informed decisions about your Azure B-series resources and optimize their usage for better performance and cost-effectiveness.