Microsoft Azure Reviews

We are faster to market with greater integration of the development and infrastructure teams.

Develop solutions quickly using the normal toolset be it either as developer, IT, DevOps or BI. Expand into new world via AI and Machine Learning.

Update two years later.... Microsoft Azure continue to expand its Platform as a Service value and has set itself apart from other cloud providers that are focused on the IaaS world. If you are a Microsoft house e.g. Visual Studio, .Net, Xamarin, O365, Windows Server or Windows Users this is a clear winner. It is easy to expand you in-house, in-data center knowledge into the cloud and Microsoft's enablement of hybrid/spanning on-premise with Cloud makes transitions easy.

In general, the entire suite of PaaS is valuable. It enables a true breakdown of IT siloes and allows an organization to embrace DevOps. It speeds up micro-service architectures and provides interesting and new opportunities to staff, generating morale boosts.

Two years later..... This has been resolved by Microsoft. There is now starting to be the challenge of figuring out which service you want to use and it is no always clear which PaaS is best for the job. This is Microsoft achilles heal across its services.

Predictability and quality need improvement. Make sure things work predictably, as expected, and are documented.

As my organization learned the new tooling that Azure provides we encountered topics where the behavior of the PaaS Resource was behaving slightly different than expected and outlined in the documentation. We usually would open a service request on the topic and be told that it is supposed to work as we expected but there is a problem and Microsoft provided a work around. An example of such a topic was IAM where a contributor on a resource group who were creating a Storage resource were told they were not authorized. The main reason was around the registration of the resource that had to be done by an administrator and manually as a one-time task. Talking to Microsoft they admitted this was an error. This was for us predominant for Storage Accounts but it did occur for some other resources as well.

The second topic we encountered were related to VM’s that would suddenly and without warning would go offline. Response from Microsoft support request was that as long as the SLA is below 99.95% they cannot do anything. Obviously you can expand the resource and the cost using a availability set, fault domains etc. but my expectations was that VM’s would only be taken down for maintenance with prior notification. This one is less critical as I agree that you need to design your VM’s using the high availability features.

I have not seen any stability issues. High availability and reliability is good if you follow Microsoft development practices.

Provides fast scalability, based on demand.

Technical support is outstanding. They provide fast and high quality support, even with lower support contracts.

I used traditional data center solutions.

The setup was complex. There is a lot of training that needs to occur with both development teams and infrastructure teams. It is a different approach. In some ways, it is more structured.

Keep to PaaS to gain the optimal benefits from an OPEX finance and resource perspective.

I also use AWS. While AWS is ahead in the IaaS technology, for a Microsoft shop, Azure is more aligned to skills.

Learn and spend up-front time on training the organization.

By migrating our infrastructure to Azure, we have been more agile on several fronts as an organization, from been able to create proof of concepts on the fly, to being able to make changes quickly and repeatedly.

• Compute (App service, and virtual machine scale sets): The ability to manage Windows and Linus virtual machines.

• Monitoring and Management: Ability to use log analytics to search, collect and visualize machine data from on-premises and cloud.

• Data Analytics: Security and Identity (Azure Active Directory): This feature adds multi-factor authentication, self-service password reset and group-based application access.

• Storage (Azure files): Still in preview at this stage, its allows the creating of SMB 2.1 shared folders on Azure storage service.

• Azure Site Recovery: Allows the replication and recovery of VMs hosted on Azure, thereby extending business values of almost any size.

• Networking (Azure ExpressRoute): This feature allows the connection of data center with Azure via private link that does not travel over the internet. Advantages include security, lower latency and higher reliability.

Every area of the product still needs to improve as it can always get better. Windows wasn't where it is today decades ago. There was a continuous improvement and evolutionary changes. Same is expected of Microsoft Azure.

Specifically, I would like to see better Azure Data Analytics and monitoring RF.

Azure is very stable with no issues at all.

The ability to scale easily is one of Microsoft Azure strength, one can start and scale up as traffic increase or as the business growth is required. So we didn't have issues with scalability.

The technical support is great.

We never used a different solution. We had a PoC with every vendor in the same competitive space and decided to go with the best.

The initial setup was very straightforward, as we knew what is required from the technical perspective and as a business. Which we specified in an architectural design before hand.

Make use of Azure pricing calculator and you will find out that Azure Is still more reasonable that the competition and do your research, when unclear speak with your MS support.

We evaluated some other competitive products and decided to go with Azure as its suit and meet our business requirement.

You need to have a clear vision of your business expectation from the product. Define your business requirements, objectives and ensure that your cloud provider can support those requirements.

Consider the cost, location, licensing, and technical capability to support and guide your organization.

Features such as Azure object storage, IaaS, Azure System Center, Azure SQL Database are valuable to me.

It provides:

• Scalable workload with elastic cloud capabilities

• Hybrid IT management of the on-premise and cloud workloads

• Disaster recovery

Azure is growing its open-source offerings and I see this as a continuous area of improvement.

I have used this solution for six years.

Early on, there were issues with the workload interruptions. Over the past 12 months, it has been a stable cloud service.

There were no issues with its scalability.

Technical support is one of Azure’s strengths, I would rate it above average to excellent.

I previously used Savvis and Verizon’s IaaS Enterprise Cloud solutions.

The initial setup was moderately complex. The use of PowerShell greatly increases the ability to fine-tune workloads, i.e., after the initial setup was completed.

If you have the existing on-premise licenses, make sure to ask for their special licensing promotions so as to allow consolidation of licenses and subscriptions, in order to maximize the current investment and control TCO.

We looked at other solutions such as AWS, Google's Cloud Platform and Terremark/Verizon.

Leverage their cloud credit program so as to allow your team to become acquainted with Azure, before turning on their cloud billing services.

The availability of the humongous amount of features and solutions in Azure are most valuable to us.

The continuous improvement of Microsoft is amazing. The agility and speed at which Microsoft is doing all this is really amazing.

The improvements are more on the partner's part than on the product's part. It is difficult to keep up with the continuous improvements that Microsoft is doing.

Issues were seen in the size and unclear configuration settings. If the bandwidth is limited, it can be an issue when migrating from on-prem to off-prem.

We have implemented this for our customers since the very beginning.

This depends on the support contract which you subscribe to. The free support is bad, but the paid versions have better support, i.e., more you pay, the better the support.

The other solutions that we had used before were on-premise solutions. We saw a major shift of the resources towards Microsoft Azure.

The setup was straightforward; with the help of TechNet, if there were any issues then they were easily solvable.

In regards to the pricing and licensing, you need to be aware of what to do. If it fits in your current licensing contract, add it to that contract. If not, then depending on the company's size, ask the reseller with whom you are doing business (or ask me) for advice on this issue.

We did evaluate other solutions and, in some cases, we also advised for this product, as it is specific to certain workloads. AWS and Google are the other vendors that we looked at.

Have a vendor agnostic partner to look at your environment and discuss the vision you have on this.

This product helps companies to build their own infrastructure in the cloud without the need of any physical server. This is nice for new, small companies. For big companies, there are services like containers, docker, and infrastructure as a service for making their environment less heavy and saving some costs, using hybrid infrastructure and service concept.

The most valuable feature is the possibility of using Microsoft and non-Microsoft services on one environment. For example, Windows servers, Linux servers, backup solutions from Veeam, etc.

There is no one special feature for me, as it makes sense as a complete package. I would mention container services as well, as this is the most modern concept of bimodal IT. For example, doing development in companies without the need of building development servers. You can just using some special parts as micro-services and putting them together like Lego pieces. This is the real benefit of cloud and Azure.

There should definitely be some improvement in the UI. It is lacking in terms of where the end user has to click on other icons and go back to the main menu to change some small settings and then go back through many options to the main request. This is something which Microsoft is constantly working on, but still it needs improvement.

Monitoring options should be more sophisticated, as there are dashboards on which a end user is able to pin a lot of charts and a number of web parts, but for example, I would love to have some option like in Operational Management Suite. For instance, some queries and filters Maybe those are already there, but I have not been able to find them. I have to combine the Operational Management suite for Infrastructure, PowerBI for subscription and Application Insight for applications.

Alternatively, I can create a PowerBI dashboard for everything, but this is not for everybody, as it is not always so easy.

Managing of separate subscriptions if you have more than one and in separate domains, it is not so easy to manage. I can’t merge all of my subscriptions, as I am able to have only one enterprise subscription in one account.

There have been no stability issues. I have some problems related to subscription management, but this is because I have more than one subscription and there were some problems related to merging those into one management.

There were no issues related to scalability at all.

Technical support is provided by ticketing system in the portal, so you can create a ticket and a few hours after that, the support guys will contact you, and will try to call you during business hours and will help you immediately. I had really specific problems a few times that needed longer discussion with support, but standard tasks were quickly resolved.

Nice and smooth since the beginning.

Related to pricing and licensing, you have to be careful how you operate with the concept. You would like to set some automation rules for automated shutdown and start up your virtual machines so that they are not consumed costs, etc. So it is about the logic of using this solution.

We evaluated Google and Amazon.

Prepare everything before implementation. Make your plan and calculate what should be the best solution or alternative for you.

This solution is at the top of what you can get at the moment on the market. There are huge amounts of separate tools and scenarios from infrastructure monitoring and administering, to hybrid scenarios or quick service creation and maintenance. The main benefit is the possibility of creating quick services, which you can select from many Microsoft and third-party service providers as well.

The pros of using Windows Azure are- 1) Windows Azure Virtual Network which enables virtual private network creation for enterprise usage 2) Support for Python, PHP, JAVA, .NET 3) More focus on application deployment, rather than infrastructure 4) Provides an application interface built on REST, HTTP, and XML 5) Content Delivery Network

Few cons on Azure are- 1) Poor debugging and logging management for applications 2) Increased competition for development resources 3) Pricing 4) load balancing causes interruption in many of the stateful applications

Windows Azure is a cloud computing platform from Microsoft for running windows applications and working with data on the cloud. It is based on the architecture of HyperV and windows fail over clustering to support redundant instances of application with zero downtime. It's built to quickly deploy application with .NET, JAVA, SQL, Python, and other cloud services. It works on the combination of SQL, azure, and AppFabric, along with other cloud services.

Microsoft Azure is essentially an IaaS solution, we use the DMs and everything in that.

Microsoft Azure is primarily an Infrastructure as a Service product.

We are satisfied with this solution.

We have not had any issues with the performance, or the stability.

It's more user-friendly than AWS.

I have only been using it for a month, so I'm still learning about the various options that are available. They have a lot of options, but I won't be able to comment unless I use it or explore it properly. Everything is fine, but I'm still learning.

The license price could be lower. If there is anything else, I will not know unless I explore.

I have just started working with Microsoft Azure. I have been working with it for one month. I got my trial subscription and started working with it.

Microsoft Azure is a stable solution.

Microsoft Azure is a scalable product.

I use it for my own personal use.

I contacted technical support a while ago. They were also helpful. I only had one question about the file quarantine and file locking options, and they were very helpful. They have a support team that responds fairly well.

For remote work, we have been using Microsoft Teams.

We are also using McAfee Proxy, as well as Box.

We are also using Amazon AWS. 

I've only recently begun working with AWS. I started but then stopped because I didn't like the user interface. 

AWS is used and preferred by a large number of customers, but I am more comfortable working on Azure rather than AWS. This is a personal preference.

The initial configuration is straightforward. We only need an email ID and we can sign up in a matter of minutes.

We can complete the installation on our own.

Pricing is determined by how much you can use and how much you want to use it.

It's not on a per-user basis; it's on a per subscription basis. It is dependent on how much you use. It has a metering system. If you use a service, you will have to pay for it. You do not have to pay if you do not use any of the services. That's how it works.

The licensing fees could be cheaper.

I would definitely recommend this solution to others who are considering using it.

I would rate Microsoft Azure a ten out of ten.

Public Cloud

Azure is a big world with potential things that we have to check and learn. We have Azure as the data analytics, artificial intelligence, and much more. I work with technology like Microsoft, Symantec, and with Azure connectivity online, like SaaS.

We are integrators for AWS and Azure.

I don't know the exact number of users because we work with different customers. So one customer is only servicing one, another customer has probably 300, another customer has probably 500. We have different customers with a different number of users that use this technology.

With the Azure solution, you can get more value from your cloud investment no matter what your future goals are. It depends on your level of familiarity with the cloud you are using or with your computing. Azure helps you with every stage of the cloud. When you start using Azure, you don't even buy it. It's just a simple sign-in and a free account, and you get free services. It's a great way to get into that kind of technology. That's why I've been using this solution for almost eight years.

They have a feature from the network, the communication, so the firewall is the most communication that we can find when we try to work with the Azure platform. Perhaps it's our environment, and that not all the customers are familiar with how to work with cloud technologies. For that reason, it's the most communication that we can find. I am in the Azure service sales, and that is one of the features that can help you to stay informed and take any action in the area that you found a thing generated for.

It has a personalized dashboard for service issues. You can check the Azure service help, and you can find any issue that you have in your platform. It's a safe point to check when you have an issue, so you can manage the issue and learn how to track that issue, and you can more effectively execute plans that you have to scale or that you have to put in action using Azure bots.

They have free coursework that you can check on the website, and a free update that you can find for SQL server security. We are more familiar with Azure, so maybe we have to wait a couple of years to get more familiar with AWS.

Something that could be added to the solution is the use of deep learning, which is going to grow in the near future.

We are waiting for a new version, a new RFID for Azure Virtual Desktop AD 1, or Virtual Live Desktop AD 1. It really needs a whole new platform, because I think their platform has the best opportunity to offer features like HORIZONT.

I have been using this solution for eight years.

I would rate this solution 8 out of 10.

My advice is to just read and keep in touch. The technology is something that I have to read about every day, keep in touch with, study, take courses, and take certifications. So, currently, the best advice I can give to anyone is to keep updated.

Every time you check online you can find a new feature from Azure. The world of Azure is so big, so there is plenty of information that you can find, check, and test.