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I'm surprised Azure still doesn't have any ARM processors to compete with AWS' Graviton instances. It's been nearly a full year since rumors of Azure working o

I'm surprised Azure still doesn't have any ARM processors to compete with AWS' Graviton instances. It's been nearly a full year since rumors of Azure working on ARM chips (https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-is-designing-its-own-arm-chips-for-datacenter-servers-report/ https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-is-designing-its-own...), and going back further it's close to 5 years since they talked up Windows Server on ARM (https://www.techrepublic.com/article/2-years-later-theres-still-no-windows-server-arm-in-microsoft-azure/ https://www.techrepublic.com/article/2-years-later-theres-st...) on Azure. Where is any of it though? I can go to AWS right now and spin up multiple different types of ARM processor instances, most of which are cheaper and more efficient for web-like workloads. It's really surprising that Azure hasn't been able to get anything out in all these years.

smoldesu 5y ago
It's very possible that there just isn't much demand. This is likely for a number of reasons: - x86 just has better support for the stuff Azure's "enterprise" customers want - ARM servers are often more expensive to spin up than an equivalently specced x86 option - PRISM compliance is easier on x86 (half-joking, half not) I like ARM, and I owned a Rev1 Raspberry Pi when those were cool. But even now, ARM still has yet to make a strong case for existing on the server. And that's before we even discuss architectures like RISC-V that are out on the horizon, much better suited for servers than ARM. I'm not planning on an "ARM revolution" taking place in the next decade unless x86 is critically compromised in some way.
- donavanm 5y ago
  Can you clarify point two? I was under the impression that the wide consensus was for Graviton instances to have significantly better price performance for most workloads. And the current state of arm support is surprisingly good for opensource or linux based server software.
- acdha 5y ago
  > But even now, ARM still has yet to make a strong case for existing on the server This is several years out of date: AWS Graviton instances are usually a fairly substantial savings over similar Intel, with AMD in between, and Cloudflare has been reporting rather good numbers as well: https://blog.cloudflare.com/designing-edge-servers-with-arm-cpus/ https://blog.cloudflare.com/designing-edge-servers-with-arm-... The main reason I suspect Azure doesn't have it is both Windows' legacy x86 hyper-focus (the days where NT ran on half a dozen platforms never really panned out) and a smaller number of managed services. AWS has very popular services like RDS, ElastiCache, ElasticSearch/OpenSearch, etc. where you can simply check a box and wait a couple minutes to see savings, not to mention things like Lambda being only slightly more work for many users, and that's a great way to get volume usage even if the average enterprise IT department is scared to go near it for VMs.
  - fomine3 5y ago
    It's not obvious whether AWS internal operation cost of Graviton instance is cheaper than Intel/AMD instance. I believe it's cheaper in AWS scale, but I also think they tactically reduce profit margin for Graviton instances, to negotiate Intel/AMD to cut down price.
    - acdha 5y ago
      That's certainly possible but wouldn't we see some indication in comparison with Azure, GCP, Oracle, etc. who would have no incentive to do so?
  - Kipters 5y ago
    >Windows' legacy x86 hyper-focus There have been multiple consumer ARM Windows products on the market for the last 9 years, I'd say Windows (client, at least) on ARM64 is as solid as its x64 counterpart
    - acdha 5y ago
      I’m aware, but everyone I know who had one of those ended up complaining about software compatibility issues. In the context of Azure, I’d imagine a lot of their customers would be especially risk averse in this regard.
mc32 5y ago
As you mention they have stated they are designing their own for multiple platforms, but at the moment they are using Qualcomm processors for their ARM offerings [https://www.lightreading.com/enterprise-cloud/infrastructure-and-platform/microsoft-qualcomm-bring-arm-to-azure/d/d-id/730959#:~:text=It's%20been%20rumored%20for%20years,its%20Azure%20cloud%20computing%20platform https://www.lightreading.com/enterprise-cloud/infrastructure....]

smoldesu 5y ago

It's very possible that there just isn't much demand. This is likely for a number of reasons: - x86 just has better support for the stuff Azure's "enterprise" customers want - ARM servers are often more expensive to spin up than an equivalently specced x86 option - PRISM compliance is easier on x86 (half-joking, half not) I like ARM, and I owned a Rev1 Raspberry Pi when those were cool. But even now, ARM still has yet to make a strong case for existing on the server. And that's before we even discuss architectures like RISC-V that are out on the horizon, much better suited for servers than ARM. I'm not planning on an "ARM revolution" taking place in the next decade unless x86 is critically compromised in some way.

donavanm 5y ago
Can you clarify point two? I was under the impression that the wide consensus was for Graviton instances to have significantly better price performance for most workloads. And the current state of arm support is surprisingly good for opensource or linux based server software.
acdha 5y ago
> But even now, ARM still has yet to make a strong case for existing on the server This is several years out of date: AWS Graviton instances are usually a fairly substantial savings over similar Intel, with AMD in between, and Cloudflare has been reporting rather good numbers as well: https://blog.cloudflare.com/designing-edge-servers-with-arm-cpus/ https://blog.cloudflare.com/designing-edge-servers-with-arm-... The main reason I suspect Azure doesn't have it is both Windows' legacy x86 hyper-focus (the days where NT ran on half a dozen platforms never really panned out) and a smaller number of managed services. AWS has very popular services like RDS, ElastiCache, ElasticSearch/OpenSearch, etc. where you can simply check a box and wait a couple minutes to see savings, not to mention things like Lambda being only slightly more work for many users, and that's a great way to get volume usage even if the average enterprise IT department is scared to go near it for VMs.
- fomine3 5y ago
  It's not obvious whether AWS internal operation cost of Graviton instance is cheaper than Intel/AMD instance. I believe it's cheaper in AWS scale, but I also think they tactically reduce profit margin for Graviton instances, to negotiate Intel/AMD to cut down price.
  - acdha 5y ago
    That's certainly possible but wouldn't we see some indication in comparison with Azure, GCP, Oracle, etc. who would have no incentive to do so?
- Kipters 5y ago
  >Windows' legacy x86 hyper-focus There have been multiple consumer ARM Windows products on the market for the last 9 years, I'd say Windows (client, at least) on ARM64 is as solid as its x64 counterpart
  - acdha 5y ago
    I’m aware, but everyone I know who had one of those ended up complaining about software compatibility issues. In the context of Azure, I’d imagine a lot of their customers would be especially risk averse in this regard.

mc32 5y ago

As you mention they have stated they are designing their own for multiple platforms, but at the moment they are using Qualcomm processors for their ARM offerings [https://www.lightreading.com/enterprise-cloud/infrastructure-and-platform/microsoft-qualcomm-bring-arm-to-azure/d/d-id/730959#:~:text=It's%20been%20rumored%20for%20years,its%20Azure%20cloud%20computing%20platform https://www.lightreading.com/enterprise-cloud/infrastructure....]