The RDS renders deployment agility and there is an on-demand database-as-a-service for MySQL, Oracle, and SQL Server.
Cloud Architect, Oracle ACE, Oracle DBA at Pythian
For many of Pythian's clients, this solution is an amalgmation of on-premis and the cloud.
What is most valuable?
How has it helped my organization?
Among other benefits, one salient benefit for many Pythian customers is the option of spinning up a new instance whenever needed. This can be done with a few clicks.
What needs improvement?
RDS doesn't have shell access, which could be especially beneficial for Oracle databases.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have used this solution for the past 2 years.
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What do I think about the stability of the solution?
I have not really encountered any issues with stability.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
I have not really encountered any issues with scalability.
How are customer service and support?
The tech support is good and prompt.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
For many of Pythian's clients, this solution is an amalgmation of on-premis and the cloud. Pythian enables its customers to reap the benefits of both worlds.
How was the initial setup?
Due to Pythian's expertise and experience, the initial setup was a breeze.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Read the fine print carefully and always engage experts to carry out migration.
What other advice do I have?
Having your database on RDS doesn't mean that you don't need DBA anymore. Mission critical and important databases must be handled by a DBA, even if the database resides on the cloud like RDS.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Sr Lead Data & Information Architect at a pharma/biotech company with 5,001-10,000 employees
Is stable and scalable, and has a pay-as-you-go license
Pros and Cons
- "It's quite stable and scalable. The price is good as well."
- "They have a low code platform, but it is for intervention."
What is most valuable?
It's quite stable and scalable. The price is good as well.
What needs improvement?
It would be good to see integration with a low code platform. They have one, but it is for intervention. It would be interesting to see it more developed.
For how long have I used the solution?
I've been using Amazon AWS for a year and a half.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It's quite stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
It's a scalable solution. It is used by our entire organization.
How are customer service and technical support?
Our experience with technical support was as expected; they responded fast.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The price is quite good; it is a pay-as-you-go option.
What other advice do I have?
On a scale from one to ten, I would rate Amazon AWS at eight.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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November 2024
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Data Science Manager at a tech services company with 11-50 employees
Simple to learn, easy to use, and useful services
Pros and Cons
- "There are many valuable features, I find the EMR in the platform easy to use and to learn."
- "Some services that are not used often have poor quality and need to be improved."
What is our primary use case?
I used the solution to build clusters. We use clusters to scale resources. We can process terabytes of data daily in batch jobs and stream processing. I have approximately five terabytes of data daily being processed in batch jobs on the EMR process. We have a script that upscales the services, resources, and runs the whole computation process, and then shuts down the resources when finished. We will also use a flow as a pipeline to build the scripts in sequence.
Additionally, my company has a lot of fraud detection solutions. We have solutions such as churn prevention, those models are now a product in AWS, and we use them. The resources and services that AWS provides are online 24 hours a day.
What is most valuable?
There are many valuable features, I find the EMR in the platform easy to use and to learn. The main services that are offered and used most often are easy to use.
What needs improvement?
Some services that are not used often have poor quality and need to be improved.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
The stability is decent with the solution.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
The solution is easy to scale the resources.
What other advice do I have?
I rate Amazon AWS an eight out of ten.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Utilities WAM consultant at a energy/utilities company with 201-500 employees
Reliable, scalable, with S3 feature included, and priced well
Pros and Cons
- "The most valuable feature of this solution is the S3."
- "The initial setup was very complex."
What is our primary use case?
Most of our applications are installed on the AWS. The enterprise solutions are installed on AWS.
What is most valuable?
The most valuable feature of this solution is the S3.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Amazon AWS for a couple of years.
We are using the latest version.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It's very reliable. We have not had any issues.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
It's a scalable solution. We have 25 users in our organization.
How are customer service and technical support?
We do not contact them directly. We reach out to our contractor and they contact AWS technical support.
How was the initial setup?
The initial setup was very complex.
What about the implementation team?
We have a reseller who helped with the deployment.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The costing model is very confusing.
The cost is on a monthly basis.
We are happy with the pricing.
What other advice do I have?
I would recommend this solution to others who are interested in using it.
I would rate Amazon AWS a nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Private Cloud
If public cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud, which cloud provider do you use?
Amazon Web Services (AWS)
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
Founder with 51-200 employees
Accessing apps on AWS via my iPhone is awful. We use it, because it improves the speed for us to access vendors.
Pros and Cons
- "It improves the speed for us to access vendors."
- "Accessing apps on AWS via my iPhone is awful."
- "AWS for API, or Seller Central, is no improvement from what we had (our internal tools we designed to update accounts, change customer network profiles, monitoring, MRTG graphs, etc), when AWS should be blazing."
What is our primary use case?
To access systems of partner/vendor companies, we maintain an instance to transfer data to our instance, then privately back to us. Basically, a BRAS, B-RAS or BBRAS device.
How has it helped my organization?
It improves the speed for us to access vendors, etc. AWS is extremely slow over the internet. Where we have GigE fiber over dedicated OC48 links, and when ping times to Dallas, TX from San Francisco is 30ms RTT on average, AWS is always 20ms higher. To AWS East, it is 70-110ms RTT, and the data transfer almost seems throttled. So I spun up an instance, made a BRAS image, like how DSL customers access the internet, and set up a peer with AWS to transfer data privately, then publicly from our instance to the AWS IP of our vendor, or partner and it has improved response times dramatically. The average API access latency was 250ms, horribly slow - already authenticated, etc.
We also use it for our Amazon Seller Account and Amazon Vendor Account, where Amazon's systems run. Amazon recently moved their systems to CloudFront, but AWS DNS is awful slow. So the BRAS helps with the DNS as well.
What is most valuable?
Bidding on instances with dynamic pricing. So, I can do something that is not critical in terms of speed, like a production system, but testing and bid at an uber low price, and I will usually get what I want.
What needs improvement?
The network is way overloaded. Comcast is overloaded. So between the two, it sucks.
I am used to Level (3) or Verizon/Alter.net AS701 with fabulous ping times and throughput, where I click something and it works.
It is the problem with the nomenclature of SDN [software defined networking] as engineers today do not understand networking, TCP/IP, or anything. I was 18 during the .com bust, but I remember accessing tools, as I worked for a Global ISP NTT, which owned Verio, the largest webhost at the time. We had Dual OC-3's to our office, when our office was just a remote NOC, but we had cloud computing before it was nomenclature. We accessed customer data, and had tools to do things quickly, instead of logging into routers, IDS, IPS, switches, and server. If it was a repetitive task, it would be via a browser, and the browser accessed a txn server rather than run cron jobs every 15 minutes. I will say that AWS for API, or Seller Central, is no improvement from what we had (our internal tools we designed to update accounts, change customer network profiles, monitoring, MRTG graphs, etc), when AWS should be blazing.
Accessing apps on AWS via my iPhone is awful. Apple is behind the times in speed, battery, and even the screen, but it is aesthetically pleasing, so it wins. Android devices by Samsung are superior, but I use iPhone because that is what we use in Silicon Valley, which is on Verizon's LTE Advanced (LTE-X is their coined term) network, and the latency is great, 20-30ms, speeds of 40 Megabits/s, symmetrical are quite common, and sometimes I see 150/150 Megabits/s.
For how long have I used the solution?
More than five years.
Which other solutions did I evaluate?
When they first moved Amazon Seller Central to AWS CloudFront from AWS, I would see connections to Hong Kong and Singapore. Maybe I was sent there because the USA East was overloaded. I do not know. So, we started using Verisign for recursive DNS, and to host our own domain name(s), and I noticed, it fixed the problem. Every ISP and DNS server, either Unicast like Level(3) 4.2.2.1-4.2.2.6, Google 8.8.8.8, NTT was the best performer 129.250.35.250/251, Comcast was garbage, while on Comcast network 75.75.75.75, Verizon was good (FiOS [consumer and SMB], and Enterprise which is what we have aka MCI aka UUNET/Alter.net AS701/AS702/AS703), and SprintLink AS1239 was good. However, we just tested Sprint, and Verizon. Verizon provides backup services for us, actually tertiary, we provide our own secondary. So I signed us up with Verisign with DDoS protection, made Verizon secondary, and the feed server from us, feeds VeriSign and Verizon. That fixed the AWS CloudFront location issue, which to me, shows how poor AWS DNS is.
We would get responses that are AWS Hong Kong, even when they moved to CloudFront to speed up Seller Central (I complained to corporate via a letter FedEx'ed to Amazon). I asked for a private MPLS link, which we would pay for, and we were told it would be worked on. During peak times, it would lag and time out, it was awful. It still lags, but I route as much as we can via the BRAS setup.
What other advice do I have?
I have pushed clients towards Microsoft Azure. I have bugged Microsoft to add links to their network in the BNA region, BNA to Atlanta (additional link), BNA to MCI aka Kansas City, BNA to Chicago, BNA to WDC, and BNA to Dallas, TX to improve access for things at BNA. It is not critical. It is just the only facility that is 30ms slower than others. Azure in Chicago, Wyoming, Bellevue, Silicon Valley, Los Angeles, or Texas is very low latency.
I have also pushed clients to IBM Bluemix, as their partnership with Akamai makes API access is really fast. Azure with Verizon CDN/Terremark is fabulous.
I have to add this. AWS sucks, even though I am a customer.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
CSO at a consultancy with 51-200 employees
Easy, flexible, high-quality
Valuable Features:
Quick to set up, dynamic pricing, very good support.
Room for Improvement:
Pricy for dedicated servers. The base package for fast bandwidth was more than I anticipated paying.
Other Advice:
They have a package where you pay an upfront cost and get locked in for a year, but the monthly cost (or per-hour cost) is much lower. Try this out if you know you'll be with them for at least a year.
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
General Manager with 51-200 employees
Beneficial pay-as-you-go subscription, priced well, and reliable
Pros and Cons
- "The interface of the solution is good."
What is our primary use case?
Our primary use case for Amazon AWS is for disaster recovery.
What is most valuable?
The interface of the solution is good.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Amazon AWS for approximately one year.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
Amazon AWS is a stable solution.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
We have three customers using this solution.
How was the initial setup?
The setup was straightforward.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
The solution is on a subscription-based model, and it is pay-as-you-go. The price could be cheaper.
What other advice do I have?
Amazon AWS is a good solution.
I rate Amazon AWS a nine out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
CEO at a tech services company with 201-500 employees
Good availability, reliable, and scalable, but it's expensive
Pros and Cons
- "The availability is good, you can get any service you need immediately."
- "AWS is very expensive."
What is our primary use case?
There is a large list of products that are available in the cloud, from computing to mail hosting and server services that are available in the AWS cloud.
They provide you with computing resources and IT services.
What is most valuable?
In terms of features, I would rate it a nine.
This is a product that is easy to use and highly available. The availability is good, you can get any service you need immediately.
For how long have I used the solution?
I have been using Amazon AWS for five or six years.
What do I think about the stability of the solution?
It's very stable.
What do I think about the scalability of the solution?
It's a very scalable product. We have 200 users in our organization who are using AWS.
How are customer service and technical support?
They provide support at different levels.
Which solution did I use previously and why did I switch?
Previously, we did not use another solution.
We use our own server in the cloud or we use AWS.
How was the initial setup?
It is in the cloud, there is no installation.
What's my experience with pricing, setup cost, and licensing?
Pricing, I would rate a five out of ten. AWS is very expensive.
It's paid on a monthly basis and you have to pay for the resources that you use.
There is no licensing in AWS, you pay per usage.
What other advice do I have?
We have reduced usability to a few situations because we have our own hosting cloud server.
I would not recommend this solution, I would recommend something from the competitors.
I would rate Amazon AWS a seven out of ten.
Which deployment model are you using for this solution?
Public Cloud
Disclosure: I am a real user, and this review is based on my own experience and opinions.
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