In this lab we will practice creating a Windows virtual machine in Azure

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Azure is cloud offering by Microsoft.

Azure offers a large collection of services including

Azure, like other cloud platforms, relies on virtualization.

Most computer hardware can be emulated in software, because most computer hardware is simply a set of instructions encoded in silicon.

Using a virtualization layer that maps software instructions to hardware instructions, virtualized hardware can execute in software as if it were the actual hardware itself.

The cloud is a set of physical servers in datacenter that execute virtualized hardware on behalf of customers.

You have two option to complete this lab

  1. Use your own azure subscription, you can sign up for trial here

  2. Use Microsoft Learn sandbox. Check more details here

Login to Microsoft Account Signup if you did not have Microsoft Account.

Click here to activate SandBox

Sign into you Microsoft Account

}} It might ask you to verify you are not a robot but solving a puzzle.

}} Click on review permissions

}} Read permissions and click Accept

}} If you already did signin into you Microsoft Account you will get below message.

Click on activate sanbox.

}} After processing it will show below message.

}} You are all set go to next step.

Open a new tab in browser and open https://portal.azure.com

Sign in with Microsoft account you used in previous step.

If you get below message click on X to close it

Else go to next step

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Select Create a resource from the Azure portal’s Azure services section. The pane to create a resource appears.

}} In Search services and marketplace search box, search for and select Windows Server, and press Enter.

The Windows Server pane will appears.

}} There are several Windows Server options to choose from to create your VM. In the Plan dropdown list, scroll down, and select [smalldisk] Windows Server 2022 Datacenter

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Azure presents a wizard as a series of tabs to walk you through all the configuration details for creating the VM.

The first tab is Basics.

You can select Next or Previous to move from one tab to another, or you can select any tab in the horizontal menu to move to a customizable configuration section.

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On the Basics tab, enter the following values for each setting.

Project details

Subscription

Concierge Subscription(the subscription that should be billed for VM hours).

Resource Group

Select learn-def83162-7369-4f06-b83a-a0581a93ad8a.

Instance details

Virtual machine name

Enter a name for your VM, such as azure101-1.

Region

Select a region close to you from the global regions listed in the following table.

Select a region from the following list when you create resources:

Availability options

Accept default No infrastructure redundancy required.

This option is used to ensure the VM is highly available by grouping multiple VMs together to deal with planned or unplanned maintenance events or outages.

Image Select

[smalldisk] Windows Server 2022 Datacenter - Gen2 from the dropdown list.

Azure Spot instance

Accept default (unchecked).

Size

The Size field is not directly editable.

Select or accept the default Standard DS1 v2, which will give the VM 1 CPU and 3.5 GB of memory.

Optionally, select the field to view recommended or recently chosen sizes; select See all sizes to explore filters for sizes based on vCPUs, RAM, Data disks, operations per second, and cost.

Administrator account

Username

Enter a username you will use to sign in to the VM.

Password

Enter a password that’s at least 12 characters long and has at least three of the following four characteristics: one lower case character, one uppercase character, one number, and one special character that is not ‘' or ‘-’. Use something you will remember or write it down, as you will need it later.

Confirm password

Enter password again.

Inbound port rules

Public inbound ports

Select Allow selected ports.

We want to be able to access the desktop for this Windows VM using RDP. (This is for lab only)

Select inbound ports

Select RDP (3389) from the dropdown list.

As the note in the UI indicates, we can also adjust the network ports after we create the VM.

Licensing

Would you like to use an existing Windows Server License

Leave unchecked

The free sandbox allows you to create resources in a subset of the Azure global regions.

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On the Disks tab, enter or select the following values for each setting.

}} Disk options

OS disk type

Accept the default Premium SSD (locally redundant storage).

Encryption type

Accept the default (Default) Encryption at-rest with a platform-managed key.

Enable Ultra Disk compatibility

Accept default (unchecked)

Data disks

Select Create and attach a new disk link.

}} The Create a new disk pane appears.

Accept all the default values for the following settings:

Name; Source type; Size; Encryption type; and Enable shared disk.

This is where you could use a snapshot, or Storage Blob, to create a VHD.

Select OK to save the settings, and close the pane.

}} On the Create a virtual machine pane Disks tab, under Data disks, there should now be a new row showing the newly configured disk.

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Select Next : Networking.

In a production system, where other components are already in use, it would be important to use an existing virtual network so that the VM can communicate with the other cloud services in the production solution.

If no virtual network has defined in this location, create it here and configure the:

Subnet:

First subnet to subdivide the address space - it must fit within the defined address space.

After the VNet is created, you can add more subnets.

Public IP:

Overall IPV4 space available to this network.

}} On the Networking tab, let’s change some of the settings.

Under the input field for Virtual network, select Create new. The Create virtual network pane appears.

On the Create virtual network pane, enter the following values for each setting.

Address space

Address range

Select the checkbox in the row below the heading, and enter 172.16.0.0/16 to give the address space a full range of addresses.

If another address range row exists, select it to delete it.

Subnets

Subnet name Select the checkbox in the row below the heading, and enter default in the first input field.

If another row exists, select it to delete it.

Address range In the empty input field, enter 172.16.1.0/24 to give the subnet 256 IP addresses of space.

}} Select OK to save your settings and return to the Create a virtual machine pane.

}} On the Create a virtual machine pane, the rest of the tabs have reasonable defaults and there’s no need to change any of them.

You can explore the other tabs if you like. Each field has an (i) icon next to it which, if selected, will show a detailed definition of that configuration setting. Reviewing field descriptions is a great way to learn about the settings you can use to configure the VM.

Select Review + create. The system will validate your options and display details about the VM being created.

}} }} Select Create to deploy the VM. The Azure dashboard will show the name VM that’s being deployed and details about your deployment. Deployment may take several minutes.

}} After deployment completes, select Go to resource. Your virtual machine pane appears.

}} Now, let’s look at what we can do with this VM.

Use IP from VM resource panel to connect to VM via RDP client

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Use IP from VM resource panel to connect to VM via RDP client

Login with userid and password used in basic settings

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Summary

In this lab, you learned how to create a Windows VM using the Azure portal.

You then connected to the public IP address of the VM and managed it over RDP.

You learned that while RDP allows us to interact with the operating system and software of the virtual machine, the portal allows us to configure the virtual hardware and connectivity.

Clean up

The sandbox automatically cleans up your resources when you’re finished with this module.

When you’re working in your own subscription, it’s a good idea at the end of a project to identify whether you still need the resources you created.

Resources left running can cost you money.

You can delete resources individually or delete the resource group to delete the entire set of resources.