[praseodym]

You'd think Microsoft would be the go-to provider for SQL Server workloads, but Azure SQL is terribly expensive for some (many?) workloads. For read-intensive SQL Server workloads you'll be paying upwards of $465/mo (Premium P1 [1]) for something that can be easily handled by a beefy VM for a fraction of the price. Also, the Azure SQL pricing model links performance ('eDTUs') to storage which skews the billing model even further.

[1] https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/details/sql-databa...

[maglite77]

[Disclosure: I work for Microsoft]

One thing to keep in mind for Azure SQL: you are getting a guaranteed SLA [1], business continuity and full point-in-time backups (up to 30 days) [2] for that price. To compare effectively you would need to price out a comparable Always-On cluster, domain controllers, SAN storage (for replication), and backup solution + storage.

[1]: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/support/legal/sla/sql-data... [2]: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/sql...

[kefka]

Precisely.

I highlight a similar pricing breakdown with their IoT / MQTT service and their price inanities as well. As far as I can tell, this insane pricing is for the idea of "Can't go wrong with purchasing Microsoft Services".... when in actuality, you can go very much wrong.