I am trying to create swap memory on an EC2 instance as RAM utilization is quite high.
As per recommendations to do it on ephemeral storage, I am trying to find out which mount point is ephemeral storage?
This is the fstab entry on my instance:
Now I need to know which one is ephemeral storage so that I can use it for swap. If any of these is not ephemeral then how can I get it?
You are using a t2.small instance type.
The T2 instance family does not have an Instance Store (also known as Ephemeral Storage).
To discover which instance types have Instance Store, see: Amazon EC2 Instance Types
On that page, you will notice that the T2 instances say EBS-Only in the Storage column. If you wish to have an Instance Store, select a different instance type that includes an Instance Store. Alternatively, just use a normal Amazon EBS volume for swap space, since the main reason for using a T2 instance is for cost savings.
Related
I am trying to understand instance store volume and I understand instance store is ideal for temporary storage and provides massive IOPS. It is retained in case of reboot but lost if you stop and start, hibernation or instance termination.
One question I have here is can Instance store be shared across EC2 instance ?
I am seeing the below in the documentation so asking. Also how to achieve this on AWS console ?
An instance store provides temporary block-level storage for your
instance. This storage is located on disks that are physically
attached to the host computer. Instance store is ideal for temporary
storage of information that changes frequently, such as buffers,
caches, scratch data, and other temporary content, or for data that is
replicated across a fleet of instances, such as a load-balanced pool
of web servers
Documentation taken : https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/InstanceStorage.html
The diagram is showing a physical host computer in an AWS Data Center. The host can be reconfigured to run many different sizes of an Instance Family (eg large, 2xlarge, 4xlarge). Do not be too concerned by the details of what it is showing.
The simple fact is that, no, instance store volumes cannot be shared across multiple Amazon EC2 instances.
The diagram given in the docs is very confusing(at least for me). I am not able to get my head around it. Maybe the InstanceA,B and C are not meant to be EC2 instances but instance store volumes as in the same diagram you see Host Computer 1 and 2.
Also the most important part is
You can specify instance store volumes for an instance only when you launch it. You can't detach an instance store volume from one instance and attach it to a different instance.
Which is what you want to know. It means you cannot share an instance store volume between 2 or more EC2 instances. When the EC2 machine is up and running, there is no way you can attach it and while launching there is no way you can specify which volume to mounted on the EC2 instance when it's created.
I have purchased an EC2 Reserved Instance. Its a t3large in some region, lets say r1. I want to install MySQL on this instance.
Now when I create the EC2 instance (t3large in r1), I come to the Storage tab:
8GB is too small for this server, I want the instance to have 100GB storage.
Questions:
If I change the storage from default 8GB to 100GB, would the instance attribute still match my reserved instance? Or because the storage is different I will be charged the On Demand rate?
Lets assume I change the default 8GB to 100GB, is this storage persistence? I have heard that instance store is not persistence... but I am not really sure if this 100GB is within the instance store? Also if this storage is not persistence, how should I add persistence storage to my EC2?
I'm pretty sure reserved instances don't cover the cost of EBS, but I can't find any document that states that at the moment. So you can choose however much storage you need. You'll pay for that separately.
t3.large doesn't have instance storage (list of instances that do). You're adding EBS storage which is network attached. It will be deleted when the instance is deleted (unless it's a secondary drive where you chose not to delete it with the instance).
On AWS I have a running t2.small - this only comes with EBS storage. It currently has an 8 Gig EBS attached storage and I want to upgrade to an m1.small which has built in storage.
If I just switch to the m1.small what will it do? Will the EBS storage stay attached and not use the built in storage? Or will it duplicate my EBS storage? Or worse still will it not re-attach the EBS storage and I'll have to attach it myself?
If you are currently running a T2.small, you will not be able to select an M1.small. Different virtualization types (HVM vs Paravirtualization).
When you change the instance type, you will be limited to instance types that match the virtualization type and storage type that you already have selected for your EC2 instance. The AMI that you selected will also limit which instance types that are supported.
Now, given that an instance type is available, your storage will stay the same and just your instance type will be changed.
Note: If the root device for your instance is an instance store volume, you must migrate your application to a new instance with the instance type that you need.
I have one service running on my t2.micro instance. How can i confirm if there is any bandwidth and storage limit or not.
Attached is that status screen shot of it.
Please guide me on this.
Thanks
Bandwidth
The only bandwidth limitation in AWS is related to the Instance Type of Amazon EC2 instances.
Put simply, smaller instances have less bandwidth than larger instances. You'll see this in the Launch Instance screen (right column):
The documentation doesn't specifically say what bandwidth you are given, but you can run some performance tests to determine available throughput.
Storage
There are two types of disk storage for Amazon EC2 instances:
Instance Storage
Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS)
Instance Storage is disk storage that is directly-attached to the instance (or, more accurately, to the host computer running the instance). As you'll see in the Instance Storage column in the above picture, not all EC2 instances have Instance Storage -- some of them just say "EBS only", meaning that it is not available.
For instance types that provide Instance Storage, the size is fixed and is again based on the Instance Type.
The most important thing to know about Instance Storage is that it is lost when an instance is stopped/terminated. This is because the virtual machine is deleted, which gives back the CPU, RAM and Instance Storage. Thus, it is only useful for temporary files, virtual memory swap files and local cache. Do not store the only copy of important data on Instance Storage.
Amazon EBS is network-attached storage. Data is retained when instances are stopped. When they are later started, the disks are exactly the same as when the instance was turned off. When an instance is Terminated, the EBS volume can optionally be kept or deleted.
EBS volumes have the advantage that you can configure a disk of any size up to 16TB and there are various different types of volumes to trade-off cost/performance.
Bottom line: Your t2.micro instance has no Instance Storage. It has EBS volumes that you have attached (at whatever size you configured). It has Low to Moderate network bandwidth.
Using ec2 Windows instance with Instance storage (let's say 32GB SSD) - where OS and its settings are stored? Like Program Files, User profiles. Are they all stored on Instance Storage? As far as I understood from other topics Instance storage is not-persistent and doesn't survive shutdowns/terminations. Does that mean I will lose everything under C: drive if I turn it off?
Can I use EBS storage as a default storage for OS (C drive)? Can I map multiple EBS storages to one Windows storage?
If above is true, then I will be charged for the capacity used by OS on EBS instance? It would be around 20GB I believe. Is that correct?
I am quite new in aws, and before paying for such instances or EBS I would like to know how this technical and billing model is working.
Thank you!
The Storage for the Root device is dependent on the AMI (EBS-Backed or Instance Store-Backed) used to launch the instance.
As far as I understood from other topics Instance storage is
not-persistent and doesn't survive shutdowns/terminations.
If the Root storage device is Instance Store, Stopping (shutdown) the instance is not possible. On termination, Both the storage and Instance does not survive. The Instance does not survive once terminated even if the AMI is EBS-Backed, but you can persist the Root Volume by setting the DeleteOnTermination flag set to False.
Does that mean I will lose everything under C: drive if I turn it off?
You cannot turn off (shutdown) an Instance Store-backed instance.
Can I use EBS storage as a default storage for OS (C drive)?
Yes, Choose an EBS backed Windows AMI.
Can I map multiple EBS storages to one Windows storage?
Yes, multiple EBS Volumes can be attached to one EC2 Windows Instance.
If above is true, then I will be charged for the capacity used by OS
on EBS instance?
You will be charged for the total size of the EBS volumes attached to the instance including the Root Device.
It would be around 20GB I believe. Is that correct?
The EBS Volume Size is adjustable. The upper Size limit is 16TiB.
Read Storage for Root Device and Ec2 Root Device Volume
Please spend more time on the AWS documentation, I don't think here is enough to cover all your question.
Only for specify EC2 instance come with attached SSD storage AKA instance storage. Bare in mind that, this instance storage doesn't come with Snapshot capabilities, so you must backup the file yourself. This is mean for people who need fastest disk access to process their data.
Only EBS allow you do multiple snapshot.
You can always create an AMI image for your instance after complete the deployment. AMI image is store inside EBS, so you will not lost the initial instance if you do this, so for new instance, you just trigger load it from AMI.
If you "Terminate" an instance, it will delete the virtual image. There is no way to recover it even with EBS, unless you make a snapshot. However, attached EBS storage will not be deleted.
EBS is calculate by Per GB and give you 1GB x 3 IOPS, with base 100 IOPS given. This is not enough if anyone want to carry out disk I/O intensive task.