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August 28, 2006

Amazon Intros Elastic Compute Cloud


Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) is a Web service that provides resizable compute capacity in the cloud. It is designed to make Web-scale computing easier for developers.

Just as Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) enables storage in the cloud, Amazon EC2 enables "compute" in the cloud. Amazon EC2's Web service interface allows users to obtain and configure capacity with minimal friction. It provides users with control of their computing resources and lets them run on Amazon's proven computing environment. Amazon EC2 reduces the time required to obtain and boot new server instances to minutes, allowing users to quickly scale capacity, both up and down, as their computing requirements change. Amazon EC2 allows users to pay only for capacity that they actually use.

Amazon EC2 presents a true virtual computing environment, allowing users to use Web service interfaces to requisition machines for use, load them with custom application environments, manage network access permissions, and run images using as many or few systems as desired.

To use Amazon EC2, users must:

  • Create an Amazon Machine Image (AMI) containing applications, libraries, data and associated configuration settings. Or use Amazon's pre-configured, templated images to get up and running immediately.
  • Upload the AMI into Amazon S3. Amazon EC2 provides tools that make storing the AMI simple. Amazon S3 provides a safe, reliable and fast repository to store images.
  • Use Amazon EC2 Web service to configure security and network access.
  • Use Amazon EC2 Web service to start, terminate, and monitor as many instances of the AMI as needed.
  • Pay for the instance hours and bandwidth that are actually consumed.

Some key features of Amazon EC2 include:

 

  • Elasticity -- Amazon EC2 enables users to increase or decrease capacity within minutes. Users can commission one, hundreds or even thousands of server instances simultaneously. Because this is all controlled with Web service APIs, applications can automatically scale itself up and down depending on its needs.

  • Complete Control -- Users have complete control of their instances. Users have root access to each one, and can interact with them as they would any machine. Each instance predictably provides the equivalent of a system with a 1.7Ghz Xeon CPU, 1.75GB of RAM, 160GB of local disk and 250Mbps of network bandwidth.

  • Designed for use with Amazon S3 -- Amazon EC2 works in conjunction with Amazon Simple Storage Service (Amazon S3) to provide a combined solution for computing and storage across a wide range of applications.

  • Reliability -- Amazon EC2 offers a reliable environment where replacement instances can be rapidly and reliably commissioned. The service runs within Amazon's proven network infrastructure and datacenters.

  • Security -- Amazon EC2 provides Web service interfaces to control network security. Users define groups of instances and their desired accessibility.

  • Pricing -- Users pay only for what they use. The initial pricing model is: 10 cents per instance-hour consumed (or part of an hour consumed); 20 cents per gigabyte of data transferred outside of Amazon (i.e., Internet traffic); and 15 cents per GB-month of Amazon S3 storage used for images (charged by Amazon S3). Data transferred within the Amazon EC2 environment, or between Amazon EC2 and Amazon S3, is free of charge.
More information can be found here.


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