Windows Azure Pack / COSN Hosting

Windows Azure Pack / Cloud OS Network (COSN) - Private NeuPrime Cloud, organized according to Microsoft Azure global standards.

For now we offer virtual servers/roles, private networks and Site-to-Site VPN services (IaaS/PaaS). Both Web portal (Tenant Portal) and API Endpoint (Tenant Public API) are available to our customers.

In two words, Azure Pack Hosting is modern Windows and Linux Virtual Servers, organized according to Microsoft Azure standards.
Do you want to check yourself? Visit Quick Start and FAQ page.

This standard is called Cloud OS Network (COSN). NeuPrime is committed to provide easy-to-use Microsoft Cloud Services to wide range of customers worldwide.

For the Windows Azure Pack customer, the Azure Pack Tenant Portal is control panel for the services.

Azure Pack Pricing

Pricing is equal to regular NeuPrime Virtual Server prices, 4Gb RAM minimum Hosting Plan is required to enable Windows Azure Pack placement.
Microsoft Service Bus is provided for free with any other Azure Pack Service purchase.

Windows Azure Pack allows you to create complex systems that work best when planned correctly.

Therefore we advise you to read this article to the end.

This page table of contents:

Key Microsoft Windows Azure Pack resources:

Windows Azure Pack Compared to Regular NeuPrime Hosting Offers

Both Windows Azure Pack and NeuPrime Control Panel can manage IT resources of some kind.

NeuPrime Panel Windows Azure Pack
Windows IIS based Websites yes
Virtual Servers yes yes
Microsoft Service Bus yes
Microsoft SQL Server yes no (planned)
mySQL Databases yes no (planned)

There is work in progress to implement all resources that Windows Azure Pack can manage.

Windows Azure Pack VPS Compared to NeuPrime VPS

Basic Windows Azure Pack usage scenario is to create and manage virtual servers and private networks.

We will try to explain the difference between regular VPS servers and Azure Pack VPS servers.

NeuPrime Panel VPS Windows Azure Pack
Management Method NeuPrime Control Panel Windows Azure Pack
+ NeuPrime Panel (planned)
Virtualization Platform Hyper-V 2008 R2 to 2022 Hyper-V 2012 R2
Hardware Node Operation standalone servers Failover cluster
NAS SSD Cache yes yes
Direct SSD placement yes (charged separately) yes (charged separately)
Windows Operation Systems 2003 - 2012 R2 2012 R2 only
Linux Operation Systems yes, including legacy yes, modern versions
FreeBSD Operation Systems no (can install yourself)
Remote Physical Console (KVM) yes (note *1)
Install OS from ISO IMAGE
(any x64 HV-supported OS allowed) 		yes
Windows Licenses Included yes yes
Mass Automated Deployment
(Server Roles for Clusters) 		yes
Private Virtual Networks yes
IP Address Space Aggregation yes
Site-to-Site VPN yes
1Gb Panel Support (basic Linux
panel to manage Websites, etc) 		yes no (planned)
1Gb Panel Integration
with Hosted Resources 		yes no (planned)
Delegated Administration partially yes
Weekly Backup yes (charged separately) yes (charged, required)
Services Management API yes

*1 - remote console connection requires Windows 2008 R2 (and newer) or Windows 7 (and newer) client system. For Mac, Linux or older PCs you will have to create temporary Windows Server VPS and use it for connection.

Windows Azure Pack has extensive gallery and template support. We fill the gallery according to your wishes! Feel free to contact us at support@neuprime.com if something is missing. For example we may add ISO with Linux you like, on request.

Windows Azure Pack Customer Solution Example

Example contains 5 virtual servers, organized according to "Single Role per Server" method, and two virtual networks.

WAP Network Sample Diagram

One network exposes public IP address as a global access point for all company services. Only VDS 5 has direct Internet connection. This way architecture provides flexibility to add new services to the same IP, and safety via limiting attack surface.

VDS 5 is an example of the VPS that has direct Internet connection. Sometimes it is required, if desired task cannot be accomplished via NAT rules of TCP or UDP front-end to back-end matching.

Virtual Networks and Public IP Addresses

We recommend you deploy your infrastructure in private networks. This is recommended practice for Azure solutions.

You can get public IP and Internet access for VPS servers in private network via "Enable NAT Access" setting. After enabling NAT you can add NAT rules to expose your internal network resources to the public Internet.

For DNS servers we advise you to fill in 94.249.192.20 and 8.8.8.8.

Direct Public IP Address

You can connect network adapters or virtual machines to "GHOSTnet Frankfurt 02" network. This will give you direct public IP address without any firewall restrictions.

Static IP address will be assigned via DHCP. Address will not change. If you add the address as a new virtual network adapter, you may need to reboot your VPS twice with 20 minutes interval.

Virtual Machine Role or Standalone Virtual Server?

Azure Machine Role is a collection of identical machines created by some given template.

There are two different use cases for the roles.

1. Scaling case. Role is a collection of machines to form a custom script managed Cluster that scale to your needs, for example to reflect the customer load. When you scale the role, you change the number of server in the cluster. When you reduce role scale, some random machines (role instances) are deleted.

2. Template case. Role machine is created by some custom role creation procedure with customized parameters. For example, this type of role can be called "CentOS Server with Joomla Website Portal". There is no need to scale such a role, but still it can be called role and created from the role creation interface.
For now, NeuPrime does not provide such a roles in a gallery.

If your case does not fit in these scenarios, you can create Standalone Virtual Server.

Important Advices on Windows Azure Pack

  • When you scale down the role, YOU DELETE RANDOM ROLE INSTANCES. Please take care not to lose some customized server that you really need. Use role scaling ONLY for AUTOMATED server creation/deletion.
  • Expanded virtual disk cannot be reduced back. Do not expand the disk beyond specific needs.

Windows Azure Pack Usage Terms and Pricing

Who is Tenant?

Tenant is administrative person on your side. Let us try to clarify the terms:

  • User is a regular customer's staff person. User does not manage services.
  • Tenant - that is you. Your Tenant Portal is https://azure.neuprime.com, your Tenant API endpoint is https://azure-tenant-api.neuprime.com.
  • Admin - that is we, NeuPrime staff. We manage the service on our side. You do not have access to our Admin interfaces and portals.

Windows Azure Pack Login

Azure Pack Login corresponds to Tenant. You should create logins for your persons and roles (if required). Logins are free of charge and unlimited.

For example, main role Tenant Login may be admin@company.com, and somebody may have login developer@company.ru for development.

Please keep in mind that all tenants have equal rights. They do not share any resources by default and do not see each other resources. Global resource usage for all of your tenants is displayed in NeuPrime Control Panel only.

Windows Azure Pack Subscriptions

Each Tenant should add subscriptions to start using services. Subscriptions are free of charge.

Subscription is mostly a way to organize resources into logical blocks. You should chose subscription that is approximately match your needs and plans. Later you can expand subscription limits if you wish to.

Co-Administrators

You can add Co-Administrators to your selected subscriptions to enable shared administration of subscription resources. Please remember that Co-Administrator does not own the resources. If you delete main administrator of the subscription, resources will not remain accessible to Co-Administrator, instead they will be deleted.

Usage Costs and Accounting

We bill for physical resources created under all your Tenant Logins.

  • Created total VPS count
  • Sum of Storage allocated
  • Sum of RAM allocated
  • Public IP addresses (for both direct IPs and Virtual Networks with NAT enabled)

You should keep your hosting plan in sync with resources you create. In case of plan out-of-sync you will be notified and there is 10 days to resolve the issue.

You should have 4Gb of VPS RAM in your Hosting Plan minimum to start using Windows Azure Pack.
Microsoft Service Bus is provided for free with any other Azure Pack Service purchase.

How to Start Using Windows Azure Pack at NeuPrime

Please check "Azure Pack" tab in NeuPrime Control Panel.

Free Trial Offer

You can use Azure Pack resources for 10 days free of charge. For existing customers there are no special terms for the test period.

For customers who did not paid for the NeuPrime service, there is active moderation of the test VPS servers created under Azure Portal accounts. We do not guarantee any SLA or any given service terms for free trial test accounts. You should NOT use free trial test period for any sensitive activity.