DrCheese Posted June 17, 2019 Posted June 17, 2019 (edited) We currently only have an offsite DC connected by VPN as a backup. Looking at doing exactly the same here, so that our passthrough auth works even when our server room is cut off for whatever reason - How much do you pay for it? Edited June 17, 2019 by DrCheese
localzuk Posted June 17, 2019 Posted June 17, 2019 Most of the cutting edge enterprise systems are started on Linux, but they soon get developed for windows. You can run a kubernetes windows node since version 1.14. So the only thing that is preventing you from running this way on windows is that most of the support is for linux. It would still work though Well, no, not really. None of the services run in the way you describe, with config and data kept in nice tidy locations easy to split out etc... and I highly suspect that Microsoft won't be rearchitecting all their service to mimic the way Linux services store their configs, when they want people to use native Azure services instead. That's kinda my point really - you're proposing that people basically rebuild their networks in a much more complex way to save money if moving to the cloud, when they'd be more simply served with native services and a hybrid solution. Your way requires a lot more technical expertise and more management time keeping it all running than schools do even if they run it all in house on servers now. Containers are great for services that scale - that's what they're for. But schools don't need scale. We don't need to grow from 1 to 20 apache servers and then back down. We run a couple of DNS servers, a print server, etc... My advice is to follow the KISS principle - if there is a native cloud application that does what you need, use that. If there isn't, host it internally on the cheapest server you can get away with until there is a native cloud application that does it. 1
dmj Posted June 17, 2019 Posted June 17, 2019 Well, no, not really. None of the services run in the way you describe, with config and data kept in nice tidy locations easy to split out etc... and I highly suspect that Microsoft won't be rearchitecting all their service to mimic the way Linux services store their configs, when they want people to use native Azure services instead. That's kinda my point really - you're proposing that people basically rebuild their networks in a much more complex way to save money if moving to the cloud, when they'd be more simply served with native services and a hybrid solution. Your way requires a lot more technical expertise and more management time keeping it all running than schools do even if they run it all in house on servers now. It comes down to a sensible design, but Kubernetes IS a native Azure service (AKS) - it does require a certain amount of re-architecture if you want to do it in a scalable and economic way. It might not help your specific circumstances if you are only running four of five servers but a larger MAT or LA would certainly find use for this sort of technology as it will save heaps of money. I now feel like I'm defending the use of a technology?!? This isn't why I came here. I came to help and offer advice of the last 10 years working with cloud services. If it doesn't fit how you have designed your systems then you don't really need to waste your time explaining to me why you can't use it.
TechMonkey Posted June 17, 2019 Posted June 17, 2019 Looking at doing exactly the same here, so that our passthrough auth works even when our server room is cut off for whatever reason - How much do you pay for it? £144 inc VAT a month. I need to dig down and look at those costs properly as looking at bicky saying his is £50 I would have thought a DC would do less work than a Print Server so wonder what that cost covers.
supportman Posted June 17, 2019 Posted June 17, 2019 £144 inc VAT a month. I need to dig down and look at those costs properly as looking at bicky saying his is £50 I would have thought a DC would do less work than a Print Server so wonder what that cost covers. That's very cool to have the backup DC in the cloud, seems a bit expensive though. Does it just work and sync like any normal DC? Do you need to do something special with DNS?
TechMonkey Posted June 17, 2019 Posted June 17, 2019 That's very cool to have the backup DC in the cloud, seems a bit expensive though. Does it just work and sync like any normal DC? Do you need to do something special with DNS? Not as far as I remember. It just sits there as long as the VPN stays up and does its thing in the background. The only special thing I remember is that you have to remote on to it from a server, but I can't remember why! If it all went wobbly we can get on via the Azure console. We had a big debate about it and were unsure but in the end we decided it was like an insurance policy. Hopefully it is money down the drain and we never need it but in the case we do we will be very glad of it. 1
DrCheese Posted June 17, 2019 Posted June 17, 2019 That's very cool to have the backup DC in the cloud, seems a bit expensive though. Does it just work and sync like any normal DC? Do you need to do something special with DNS? If you use AD passthrough auth for your office365 install it's useful for keeping online services up if your server room gets cutoff for any reason, as without your Azure AD connect server being online you can't manually switch over to password sync anymore and have to contact Microsoft, which by the time they've got back to you, your server room is usually back online. 1
Archipelego1 Posted June 21, 2019 Author Posted June 21, 2019 (edited) We currently use Azure for: 1. Blob storage for offsite DR backups 2. DNS for all our external facing domains 3. Hosting a "status" website We will likely end up growing this use over time, as we are planning on going "onsite serverless" over the next 2 years. I've been looking into using Azure as a storage location for backups. Do you use Veeam to offsite your backups? Edited June 21, 2019 by Archipelego1
Roberto Posted June 21, 2019 Posted June 21, 2019 (edited) Thanks for the replies so far. I'm looking more for real world examples of what some of you folks are currently (or in the process of) using Azure for, not really what MS and other suppliers say it can do for you. Old college had website in Azure, Domain Controller and ADFS as Azure VMs, backups sent to Azure with Microsoft, and stuff like that. Current employer we are putting as much as we can in Azure, both VMs and various apps as a service. Edited June 21, 2019 by Roberto
localzuk Posted June 21, 2019 Posted June 21, 2019 I've been looking into using Azure as a storage location for backups. Do you use Veeam to offsite your backups? We back up to a local NAS with Veeam, than back up the last 30 days (rolling) to Azure with Cloudberry Ultimate. This also allows us to set a "delete old backups after" time, so we can set that to 180 days, to ensure we don't get hit by the "you stored it for less time" charges with Archive tier storage. We currently have 62TB of data in our backup storage on Azure.
Roberto Posted June 21, 2019 Posted June 21, 2019 Good to know - thanks! Is there a financial advantage to buying through a reseller over just paying MS directly? Not sure if this has changed but at one point you needed to buy education reserved instances through a reseller. Reserved instances are cheaper than PAYG.
flyinghaggis Posted June 21, 2019 Posted June 21, 2019 (edited) We back up to a local NAS with Veeam, than back up the last 30 days (rolling) to Azure with Cloudberry Ultimate. This also allows us to set a "delete old backups after" time, so we can set that to 180 days, to ensure we don't get hit by the "you stored it for less time" charges with Archive tier storage. We currently have 62TB of data in our backup storage on Azure. How are you backing up to Azure? Are copying the Veeam backups into the Azure storage or using Cloudberry (I haven't really used Cloudberry so not sure what it offers) as another backup product which links to Azure? We have Veeam and are investigating the options for cloud/offsite backup. We looked at Veeam Cloud Connect as an integrated solution but it's likely more than the school's budget will allow at this stage so wondered if there were other more cost-effective options? Edited June 21, 2019 by flyinghaggis
localzuk Posted June 21, 2019 Posted June 21, 2019 How are you backing up to Azure? Are copying the Veeam backups into the Azure storage or using Cloudberry (I haven't really used Cloudberry so not sure what it offers) as another backup product which links to Azure? We have Veeam and are investigating the options for cloud/offsite backup. We looked at the integrated Veeam Cloud Connect but it's likely more than the school's budget will allow at this stage so wondered if there were other more cost-effective options?Cloudberry copies the Veeam backups separately. Not the most elegant solution but it is so very cheap.
flyinghaggis Posted June 21, 2019 Posted June 21, 2019 Cloudberry copies the Veeam backups separately. Not the most elegant solution but it is so very cheap. Like you say I think most schools would place value above elegance when it comes to IT solutions at the moment! We did look at this but the internet link to our backup server location is only 100 Meg so I'm not sure how practical it would be to copy the files on a frequent basis. Does Cloudberry have any features which speed up the file transfer?
themightymrp Posted July 11, 2019 Posted July 11, 2019 I'd be interested in looking into how to use Azure Backup for our VM's and few remaining physical servers. Currently use Redstor for offsite backup but I feel we are paying a lot for it. I'm not sure how Azure Backup storage really works in terms of how much storage you pay for? I assume you pay for the actual amount of data currently on your server plus however much is used by the daily incrementals? With Redstor we pay for how much data is being backed up from our servers and that's it. For example, if I'm backing up a server holding 1.4Tb of data, I pay for 1.5Tb storage (they go in increments of 500Gb). It doesn't matter how much the data changes daily or if I keep 60 days worth of data - a long as my server stays within that 1.5Tb storage limit then that's all I pay for. The total stored on redstor's systems may grow to many Tb's over those months but that's their concern not mine. Currently paying over £4k per year for 3.5Tb which feels steep now :-/
supportman Posted July 12, 2019 Posted July 12, 2019 Azure Site recovery is incredibly cheap and works very well apparently. I was at a seminar run by Design & Management systems the other day and they were talking about it, looked very simple.
localzuk Posted July 12, 2019 Posted July 12, 2019 You pay for the storage you use - so, if your backup data totals 3TB, you pay for 3TB. If an incremental adds 200GB, you pay for 3.2TB that month. We don't use Azure Site Recovery - doing so would cost us about £750 a month to cover all our VMs, compared to £50pm for just storing data in blob storage (60+TB for that). 1
SVM Posted July 12, 2019 Posted July 12, 2019 What services from Azure are using to store 60tb for £50 per month ? from the calculators it should be around £400/500 You pay for the storage you use - so, if your backup data totals 3TB, you pay for 3TB. If an incremental adds 200GB, you pay for 3.2TB that month. We don't use Azure Site Recovery - doing so would cost us about £750 a month to cover all our VMs, compared to £50pm for just storing data in blob storage (60+TB for that).
themightymrp Posted July 12, 2019 Posted July 12, 2019 Forgive my ignorance, what is the blob storage? Is that something you can still use for data backups? Does it update regularly or is it more for the monthly complete backup kind of thing? Cheers
localzuk Posted July 12, 2019 Posted July 12, 2019 This is the page for it - https://azure.microsoft.com/en-gb/services/storage/blobs/ It is just storage. You have to figure out how to back up to it yourself - I use CloudBerry Ultimate, but there are other options. 1
SVM Posted July 12, 2019 Posted July 12, 2019 For some reason the calculators show £82.43 for 60TB per month then there are the misc costs getting data there which takes it up to £123 per month but left these at default for write operations etc
localzuk Posted July 12, 2019 Posted July 12, 2019 (edited) For some reason the calculators show £82.43 for 60TB per month then there are the misc costs getting data there which takes it up to £123 per month but left these at default for write operations etc It might be about £82 - I've not finished this month yet. I'll be able to give an accurate picture at the end of next month. My figures for this month are skewed as I've been changing stuff so I did a 9.5TB upload over the last 4 days instead of the usual 1.5TB on a weekend. OK. So the billing system is confusing and doesn't really make sense to me. According to the metrics, I have 80.8TB of data in archive storage but for some reason they are only listing 24.95TB chargeable. So I'm a little confused by them! Edited July 12, 2019 by localzuk
owen1978 Posted July 26, 2019 Posted July 26, 2019 Quite an interesting thread with some interesting ideas... Will definitely looking into blob archive storage sounds! I like the idea of hosting a DC in Azure.... It got me thinking.... How feasible is this in a school of 4K students .... host the PDC in Azure which is connected via VPN. On premise have 2 DC's. So devices use the local DC's. Any changes to AD are updated at the PDC and replicated to the on premise DC's.
dmj Posted July 26, 2019 Posted July 26, 2019 How feasible is this in a school of 4K students .... host the PDC in Azure which is connected via VPN. On premise have 2 DC's. So devices use the local DC's. Any changes to AD are updated at the PDC and replicated to the on premise DC's. We did this in my old place. Had one DC in the cloud (Google cloud engine) and two on site linked via VPN. I understand that since I left they now have 2 DC's in Google. It worked really nicely. At the place I am now we are moving two DC's to Azure.
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