Microsoft will reduce the size of its Windows Server in order to lower costs for Azure customers.
The reduced Windows Server versions will appear in Azure Managed Disks, which was launched in February 2017 to simplify the management and scaling of Virtual Machines.
Microsoft’s Managed Disks area offered at sizes 32GB, 64GB, 12GB, 512GB and one terabyte. However, in order to reduce the costs even further, the company created even lower disk pricing options with smaller 32GB and 64GB Standard Managed Disk sizes.
Following the mission to cut costs, Microsoft also said it has “added a second set of Windows Server offerings with 30GB OS disks for Windows Server 2008R2, Windows Server 2012, Windows Server 2012R2 and Windows Server 2016 in Azure Marketplace.”
The company has revealed that the addition of the smaller sizes will have ‘smalldisk’ embedded in the image title on Azure Portal. Powershell, CLI and ARM Templates, will have the image SKU built with a small disk.
Read more: UK cloud wars intensify as Microsoft lowers prices & releases Azure data centre services
For applications that may not require large amounts of OS disk space, Microsoft has said there will be total savings of $2.18 per VM for customers that choose to deploy the new 32GB Standard Managed OS disk or 127GB.
Larger scale deployments are also expected to see similar cost savings, depending on the size of the OS disk chosen. They size of the disk can also be expanded.
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Overall, the reduction of Microsoft’s Windows Server has been delivered in its ongoing aim to lower prices for Azure customers.
The cloud wars race continues to accelerate after the company lowered prices for its Azure customers in February. This was during the development of new features for its Azure Backup and Site Recovery, which Microsoft also made available across all its cloud regions in the UK.
