Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling Reviews

We use EC2 to host applications.

The most useful feature is elasticity. You can scale up or down based on traffic.

The primary area for improvement is the pricing model. 

We have been using EC2 for around 36 months.

I rate EC2 nine out of 10 for stability.

I rate EC2 eight out of 10 for scalability. 

I rate AWS support nine out of 10. 

Positive

I rate EC2 eight out of 10 for ease of setup. The deployment takes four to six hours. Once the application is bundled, it is transported to Site Reliability Engineering, which hosts it. The deployment team consists of four or five people.

We've saved money on resources and infrastructure. The ROI can't be easily defined because it is a cloud service.

I rate EC2 seven out of 10 for affordability. 

I rate AWS EC2 nine out of 10. I recommend it for base production systems.

EC2 and Auto Scaling are solutions to deploy computer VMs. When you use Auto Scaling, you have many advantages because the platform is elastic. When your platform requires high performance, Auto Scaling can provide this and avoid replication.

For clients, I deployed many Auto Scaling solutions for different applications, and currently I'm using Auto Scaling to deploy FortiGate. FortiGate is a next-generation firewall that provides security for AWS in general.

One of the most important benefits is that a company can optimize resources because Auto Scaling deploys resources when needed. For example, for Black Friday, a company can deploy 100 servers for a couple of days. When Black Friday is over, the company can delete those servers.

This solution makes it easier to provide a good customer experience because if you deploy the right infrastructure, the website will work properly and the user experience will be good.

The documentation for this solution could be improved. For example, sometimes it's difficult to find documentation for integration with applications. 

I have been using this solution for five years.

This is a stable solution. 

Scalability is very good because you can deploy the infrastructure as you need it. 

The customer support for this solution is excellent. 

The initial setup on the first day was a little bit challenging but with time became easier. 

I would rate this solution a ten out of ten. 

The client had a requirement to make sure there was a specific amount of memory utilization for each of the EC2 instances. When it reached its maximum or a threshold limit. The client wanted the Auto Scaling to scale up more easily to instances onto the system, with all the relevant security configurations, and everything available. That was his business problem. He didn't want to pay a lot at once, however, he didn't want to leave the system in a state that should not be in a position to be unable to handle jobs due to heavy usage or if there is a demand. The client wanted to make sure the demand was met and he wanted to make sure the service that he was obtaining from AWS was not idle.

Therefore, we provided the Auto Scaling EC2s. While we designed the solution, we identified what could be the minimum utilization based on the on-prem solution that they had. It was kind of a migration solution. The client had an on-prem environment and wanted to go into AWS in a cost-effective way. To ensure cost-effectiveness, we proposed Auto Scaling, so that if there was a heavy demand for memory, Auto Scaling could start scaling up based on the demand. And then, when the demand is reduced, it would automatically scale down and run on a specific minimum usage so that the cost will be at the minimum. 

When customers decide to go from on-prem to cloud, they have a lot of issues. For example, once they're comfortable on-prem, they don't want to spend a lot of operational expenses. Amazon services, however, are OpEx; it's operational costs only that you have to pay. Therefore, there is a lot of resistance that could come from the client. However, with Auto Scaling, since it guarantees that you will not be charged for what you are not using, the customer is very happy. That enables people to move into the cloud with relative comfort. 

The cloud migration is very easy and problem-free. It's not so complex. We didn't face any issues migrating. It was very fast. 

The initial setup itself was very straightforward. 

Technical support is responsive.

The solution is stable.

The scalability is good. 

The integration capabilities are good. 

We have found the solution offers good security capabilities. 

We do have some issues sometimes when something is not configured in the correct way. However, users can avoid this type of trouble by being knowledgeable about the product.

The price could always be a bit better. 

On the ECs, the T2 microservice is the lowest tier. That particular tier could be a little better than what they're offering currently. You cannot do anything at all on that T2 micro. It's a useless tier to have introduced, as you can't do anything at all. You would be able to log in and log off and do some simple features which are already available on that operating system. Yet you cannot install anything. You cannot do anything at all. 

I've used the solution for six months or so. 

The product is very, very, very stable, even though some instances crashed due to instability here and there. Since it's Auto Scaling, there was another instance that would come up quickly. Overall, however, it was reliable. 

The solution is very scalable.

Currently, I've worked with two clients that have used the solution. 

Technical support is good. They are quite responsive. 

Positive

It was a straightforward setup, however, there were additional test scenarios we had to do, as we had to prove that services will not degrade during the time the systems are scaling up and scaling down. Those kinds of test scenarios took us little time for us to prove it meets their requirements. Apart from that, it was very easy and straightforward. 

The deployment doesn't take long, although there were some idle times. If I cut out all the idle time, we completed that project within two weeks. 

The deployment could be handled by one person. We have two staff that are not full-time handling it. We wanted some redundancy, which is why we have two, however, you only need one. 

There are no licensing costs. However, there is a monthly service charge.

We are a system integrator. I was more of a DevOps engineer on that. In the company that I'm working with, we provide the required staff augmentation to get that solution up and running.

I'd rate the solution nine out of ten. 

We use the solution to launch the instances.

The solution's most valuable feature is auto scaling group.

The solution's stability and scalability need improvement.

We have been using the solution for a year.

I rate the solution's stability a nine. Although, it could be more stable for Asia-specific regions.

I rate the solution's scalability an eight. It is expensive to scale it for multiple instances.

The solution's initial setup is straightforward. We use template plans and modify them as per the specific requirement. The deployment takes two to nine months to complete.

The solution's price is affordable for enterprise customers.

I rate the solution as nine out of ten. It is easy to maintain multiple instances using it.

Our company uses the solution to cluster cloud services for our customers who need elastic computing. Our customers currently have thousands of service users. 

The solution includes many features for configuring networks and VPCs. 

The pricing could be reduced. 

I have been using the solution for five years. 

The solution is the most stable service engine offered by AWS. 

The solution is scalable because it is cloud-based. 

Technical support is perfect so I rate them a ten out of ten. 

Positive

The solution is cloud-based so there is no setup. It is important, however, to configure the Auto Scaling feature which takes about ten minutes. 

We deploy the solution in-house and it is easy. Deployments and ongoing management are handled by two technicians. 

The solution pricing varies by service region is mid-range. Various conditions determine pricing such as the IP selected. 

I rate pricing a six out of ten. 

The solution is an alternative to Lambda. Some customers prefer Lambda because it is very efficient and can complete processes up to four times faster.

Every AWS user should utilize the solution if they are not using Lambda.

I recommend the solution and rate it a ten out of ten. 

We use the solution to increase CPU and memory size. 

I have been using the product for six to seven years. 

The tool is stable, old and mature. 

I would rate the solution's stability a nine out of ten. We have 200 users for the product. 

The product's setup is complex for an intermediate user. However, it's easy for the experience. The tool's deployment is a step-by-step process. 

I would rate the product a ten out of ten. 

We use the solution to autoscale the number of servers per specific business requirements.

The solution allows setting the number of servers required depending on the usage. Later, it automatically increases or decreases the servers per the threshold level.

There should be fewer inputs required that include mandatory details for configuration. It will help someone with less technical knowledge easily set up the system.

I have been using the solution for more than seven years.

The solution is stable. I rate its stability a nine out of ten.

I rate the solution's scalability an eight out of ten.

The solution has generated over 50-55% ROI for us. It is higher compared to GCP.

The solution is less expensive than Azure and GCP.

I rate the solution a nine out of ten.

We use EC2 for regular usage based on on-demand pricing or cost-saving plans and Reserved Instances, depending on the customer's needs.

If customers want to use an instance for a longer time and maximize usage, we recommend savings plans and Reserved Instances instead of on-demand pricing.

We use Auto Scaling based on the customer's use case. For example, one of my customers utilizes EC2 with custom scaling configurations.

It depends on the specific case or business scenario. Sometimes, Auto Scaling is more beneficial, and sometimes, Reserved Instances are preferred, especially for longer-term usage. It varies based on the use case.

It should be more stable, more secure, and have better pricing.

I'm on the leadership side, so I don't directly work with EC2 instances. However, we sell service to the customers.

It is a stable solution.

It is a scalable solution. There are numerous customers, or more than a hundred customers, using this solution.

Customer service depends on the support model and the type of support you have chosen.

The initial setup was easy and took only a couple of minutes. It's just a few clicks.

The licensing cost is expensive.

Overall, I would rate the solution an eight out of ten.