Understanding Azure Virtual Machines

In this chapter, we will cover one of the most popular Azure services: Azure virtual machines. We will introduce you to Azure VMs and their types. You will learn how to create Azure VMs, and how they relate to Azure Storage and networks.

The following topics will be covered in this chapter:

• Introducing Azure virtual machines
• Creating an Azure virtual machine
• Azure virtual machine storage
• Azure virtual machine networking

Introducing Azure virtual machines

Azure virtual machines (VMs) comprise the most well-known and usable service available in Azure, as well as the oldest. Azure virtual machines provides deployment of different flavors of Windows and Linux VMs.

Azure VMs provide you with full control over the configuration and management of the VM. Management refers to installing software, patching, and even maintaining the VM.

Azure VM statuses

Fortunately, Microsoft bills VMs per minute, not per hour; therefore, when you use a VM for 30 minutes, you will only be charged for 30 minutes. Also, when the VM is not running, you will not be charged for the computing resources (CPU and memory); however, you will be charged for the VM storage. Let...

Creating an Azure VM

Creating an Azure VM is a very straightforward process; all you have to do is follow these steps:

1. Open the Azure portal and navigate to Virtual machines, as shown in the following screenshot:

2. Click on Add, and a new blade will be opened, where you will have to specify some common requirements with which you should be familiar, such as the following:
   • Subscription: The subscription that will be charged for using this service
   • Resource group: The resource group in which Azure VM will exist as a resource
   • Name: The name of the VM
   • Region: Select the nearest region to you or to the services that would work with this VM.
   • Availability options: Azure offers a range of options for managing the availability and resiliency of your applications. You can select any of the following three options, according to how critical the applications that you will operate in the...

Azure VM storage

As we mentioned earlier, Azure VMs depend on Azure Storage to function properly. Now, let's go through some storage considerations for Azure VMs, in order to create a better design for your environment.

Managed versus unmanaged disks

As we mentioned earlier, managed disks save effort, and they support both premium storage and standard storage.

Managed Disks-key points

Let's cover some of the key points of Managed Disks, which may influence your design, and even your choice of using them:

• Simplicity: Using Managed Disks will eliminate many concerns...

Azure VM networking

There are many networking configurations that can be set for the VM. You can add additional NICs, change the private IP address, set a private or public IP address to be either static or dynamic, and change the inbound and outbound security rules.

Adding inbound and outbound rules

Adding inbound and outbound security rules to the VM NIC is a very simple process; all you need to do is follow these steps:

1. Navigate to the VM that you want to add inbound/outbound rules to.
2. Scroll down to Networking, under Settings, as shown in the following screenshot:

3. To add inbound/outbound rules, click on Add inbound port rule or Add outbound port rule and follow the steps discussed in the NSG section of the previous...

Summary

In this chapter, we covered some of the most interesting elements of Azure VMs, as well as how to configure them and properly design a VM's storage and networking.

In the next chapter, we'll introduce one of the most commonly used Azure PaaS solutions: Azure Web Apps.

Questions

1. What state would the VM turn into if you shut it down from inside the OS?
   • Stopped
   • Shutdown
   • Stopped (deallocated)
2. Which VM series is the oldest of the following options?
   • B-Series
   • A-Series
   • D-Series
3. What is the recommended disk to store paging files?
   • OS disk
   • Temporary disk
   • Data disk
4. Which statement is true about Availability Sets?
   • VMs must have the same number of NICs
   • Each VM can only have one NIC
   • VMs in the same availability set should have at least two NICs

Further reading

• IP Forwarding (https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-network/virtual-network-network-interface#enable-or-disable-ip-forwarding)
• VM scale set (https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/overview)
• Availability Zones (https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/availability-zones/az-overview)
• VM images (https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machines/windows/capture-image-resource)