Amazon Offers Windows Server With Free Usage Tier

by Jennifer Johnson — Monday, January 16, 2012, 12:51 PM EDT

In a recent announcement, Amazon said the AWS (Amazon Web Services) Free Usage Tier will now include Amazon EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud) instances running Microsoft Windows Server. If your business is eligible for the AWS Free Usage tier, you'll be able to run Windows Server in Amazon's cloud for up to 750 hours per month at no charge.

Amazon launched the Free Usage Tier in 2010. Until now, the service was only available with Linux. With the Windows Server offering, users will be able to select from a number of pre-configured Amazon Machine Images with Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2. A full copy of the announcement can be found below:

AWS Free Usage Tier Now Includes Windows

We are excited to announce that starting today, the AWS Free Usage Tier will now include Amazon EC2 instances running Microsoft Windows Server. Customers eligible for the AWS Free Usage tier can now use up to 750 hours per month of t1.micro instances running Microsoft Windows Server for free.

With this announcement, customers familiar with Windows Server can gain hands-on-experience with AWS at no-cost. Customers can select from a range of pre-configured Amazon Machine Images with Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2. Once running, customers can connect via Microsoft Remote Desktop Client to begin building, migrating, testing, and deploying their web applications on AWS in minutes. The expanded Free Usage Tier with Microsoft Windows Server t1.micro instances is available today in all regions, except for AWS GovCloud.

For more information about the AWS Free Usage Tier, please visit the AWS Free Usage Tier web page. To get started using Microsoft Windows Server on AWS, visit the AWS Windows web page.

Tags: Amazon, Enterprise, Cloud, Windows Server

Jennifer Johnson

Jennifer grew up around technology. From an early age, she was curious about all things related to computers. As a child, Jennifer remembers spending nights with her dad programming in BASIC and taking apart hard drives to see what was inside. In high school, she wrote her senior term paper on her experiences with building custom computers.

Jennifer graduated from the Jeffrey S. Raikes School of Computer Science and Management at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln. After college, she began writing full-time for various PC and technology magazines. Later, she transitioned to the Web. In these roles, Jennifer has covered a variety of topics including laptops, desktops, smartphones, cameras, tablets, and various consumer electronics devices. When she's not playing with or writing about the latest gadget, Jennifer loves to spend time with her family, capture memories with her camera, and scrapbook.

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