On Wed, Feb 22, 2012 at 2:10 PM, Roy Tennant <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> I'd also be interested in getting some real world cost information. I
> installed an app on EC2 that went mostly unused for a couple months but
> meanwhile racked up over $300 in charges. Color me surprised.
>

EC2 can be a bargain or a cash hog depending on what you do. Some aspects
of their service are cheap, others are not so cheap. In all cases, you want
to be very aware of what you're using and making sure you're not paying for
things you don't need.

For example, it's really important not to pay for excess capacity. In the
regular world, you buy capacity for your highest potential use case. But if
you do that with Amazon, you'll rack up charges quickly with such an
approach. Set things up so you have what you need only when you actually
need it. You have to pay attention to their pricing structures as doing the
same thing on EC2 can cost wildly different amounts depending on how you do
it.

We've used EC2 for a few years, have been very happy with the experience,
and are tending to shift more services in that direction. Provisioning what
you need is a snap, changing what you have to meet your needs on the fly is
easy, and it's been very cost effective for us.

kyle

-- 
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Kyle Banerjee
Digital Services Program Manager
Orbis Cascade Alliance
[log in to unmask] / 503.999.9787