Updated #2: How Elastic is the Oracle Cloud

By | July 15, 2020

Per-Second billing now on almost all resources!

June 2020 Update:
– Database Cloud Service uses per second billing for VM, Baremetal and Exadata
– Updated Exadata CS for the new X8 Shapes
– Added list of OCI Autoscaling features, including the new schedule based scaling for instance pools

May 2020 update:
– Compute now uses per second billing
– Autonomous Database now uses per second billing
– New E3 Compute shape that supports flexible shape in the form of # of CPUs

March 2020 update:
– Compute VMs now support automated shape change
– Database VMs now support automated shape change
– Exadata Shapes now only have a minimum term of 48 hours (instead of 30 days)

One of the key characteristics of Cloud Computing is elasticity; resources that are available on-demand when needed and stopped when not needed, resources that can scale to the current demand. This elasticity is not only great to ensure well performing applications, but can also significantly help to reduce the cost of such solutions.

Let’s take an Example: You want to have an Analytics Environment to discover valuable data for your business. An analytics environment typically only needs to run when the user is actually working with it. This will clearly not be 24/7. The database behind the analytics environment might also only need to run during the use of analytics. So in some cases both can be powered off when not needed, resulting in significant cost saving.

Service Cost 24×7 per Month Cost 10×5 per Month Savings
Analytics Standard @ 2 OCPU $2,000 $896 $1,104 (55.2%)
Autonomous Data Warehouse @ 2 OPCU $2,500 $874 $1,626 (65.1%)
Total Monthly cost $4,500 $1,769 $2,731 (60,7%)

In case you are wondering why the savings on Autonomous DB is different then on Analytics cloud; Autonomous has zero CPU cost when not running, while the Analytics cloud charges 15% of CPU while not running.

Save Money, but get POWER when needed!

In the above example you see the savings these services can give you if you run them “smartly”, but sometimes you just want to go fast! These service support scaling so you will have that option. The above configuration/price is based on 2 OCPUs for each service but:

  • Autonomous DB can scale WITHOUT downtime from 1 to 128 OCPUS
  • AnalyticsCS can scale WITHOUT downtime between 2,4, 6 or 8 OCPUS

So if you need some extra juice, you can! You will only be paying extra for the duration (in hours) for the extra capacity.

Oracle Cloud Services Elasticity Overview

Service Suspend Suspend Cost Scale Up/Down OCPU Range Scale In/Out Comments
Compute VM Yes Storage Cost Change shape requires a reboot Intel and E2 Shapes:
1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 24
E3 Shapes:
Any CPU between 1 and 64
via Instance Pool Stopping of billing only for Standard shapes not based on Windows OS. Per-Second billing
Compute BM Yes Storage cost No 36,44,52,64, 128 No Stopping of billing only for Standard shapes not based on Windows OS, Per-Second billing (min one hour)
Compute Instance Pool Yes Storage Cost Change shape requires a reboot   Yes, 1 to many nodes Per-Second billing
Database VM Yes Storage Cost Change shape requires a reboot, when using RAC no downtime needed 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 24 Yes, RAC 2 Nodes Per second billing
Database Bare Metal No   Yes 2 – 52 OCPU No DB license for OCPU is scalable. There is a fixed infrastucture cost for the BM server. Per second billing
Exadata CS Quarter X8 No   Yes 0 – 100 OCPU RAC 2 Nodes Fixed Infra cost. Minimum term is 48 hours, there after per hour. Per second billing
Exadata CS Half X8 No   Yes 0 – 200 OCPU RAC 4 Nodes Fixed Infra cost. Minimum term is 48 hours, there after per hour. Per second billing
Exadata CS Full X8 No   Yes 0 – 400 OCPU RAC 8 Nodes Fixed Infra cost. Minimum term is 48 hours, there after per hour. Per second billing
Autonomous DB Yes Storage Cost Yes 1 – 128 OCPU Above 16 OCPU split on multiple RAC Nodes Per-Second billing
Analytics CS Yes 15% of OCPU hour rate Yes (2,4,6,8) or (10,12) No Shapes 1, 16, 24,236,52 do not provide scaling
Java CS Yes Storage Cost No   Yes, 1,2 or 4 Nodes  
Visual Builder CS Yes   No   No  
Big Data Cloud Yes Storage Cost No 2,4,8,16,24 Yes, 1 to 100 nodes  

Native OCI Auto-scaling Features

OCI is getting more and more native auto scaling features. Currently there are 2 services that have an auto scaling method.

  • Instance Pools; Based on CPU or Memory load, Schedule based auto-scaling
  • Autonomous DB; Automatic CPU scaling based on load up to 3x the default size.

Auto-scaling by Scripting

If you want to scale other things besides Instance Pools or the CPU of an autonomous database, you can my Auto Scale Script

The Super Scale” script that can automatically power on/off and scale Compute and Database Instances. I will also soon be adding support for the Analytics cloud and some other services in this script, so “To be continued…” 🙂

https://github.com/AnykeyNL/OCI-AutoScale

Category: OCI

3 thoughts on “Updated #2: How Elastic is the Oracle Cloud

  1. Pingback: OCI Autoscale Super Script – Oracle Cloud Blog

  2. Gopinath

    Hi Richard,

    Thank you very much for providing the script. could you please add support for the Analytics cloud as you mentioned. that would be helpful.

    Regards,
    Gopinath.

    Reply

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