AWS FSx for Windows File Server

Owned by Dave Laing
Sept 14, 2023
1 min read

Overview

The AWS FSx service is a fully managed, high performance file system that can replace customers on premise file servers. Cloudamize has the capability to recommend Amazon FSx where customers have Windows File Servers in place on-premise.

What is Supported?

Cloudamize can identify Windows Servers currently sharing files and folders via SMB. Storage on such servers can be migrated to FSx without necessarily moving the servers to EC2 instances.

Data Collection

Cloudamize will collect the necessary data for FSx migrations using data currently gathered by Agent and Agentless Data Collectors, nothing further is required to provide the data necessary for these recommendations.

How it Works

Windows servers that are sharing files via SMB will be included in the analytics for FSx recommendations. Note that C:\ drives or any administrative shares (those ending in $ (eg. \ADMIN$ or \IPC$)) are excluded from this. Recommendations for FSx are then made based on multiple factors, and included with final TCO results.

What it looks like

The Assessment Details screen, and its downloadable report, includes an FSx tab that shows the results of the recommendation calculations, with the following columns:

  • Instance Name

  • Single-AZ/Multi-AZ

  • Storage Type (SSD/HDD)

  • Storage Capacity (in GB)

  • Deduplication %

  • Actual Capacity

  • Throughput (MBps)

  • FSx cost

  • EC2 Compute cost

  • EBS Storage cost (Note: this will include the C:\ drive in addition to the data drives)

  • Total Instance cost (EC2 Compute cost + EBS Storage cost)

  • Monthly Savings (Total Instance cost - FSx Cost)

 

For more details on AWS’s FSx offering please see their documentation at See Windows File Server - Amazon FSx for Windows File Server - AWS, or reach out to AWS directly.

If you have queries regarding Cloudamize’s presentation of these recommendations please get in touch with the Technical Helpdesk at helpdesk@cloudamize.com