Amazon Web Services (AWS) introduced a new version of its Aurora database this week named Amazon Aurora I/O-Optimized, generally accessible. The biggest change in this version is the elimination of all I/O costs for database use, which will reduce overall database expenses for clients with heavy workloads and increase billing predictability for cloud databases.
“With the new Aurora configuration, customers only pay for their database instances and storage consumption with no charges for I/O operations. Customers can now confidently predict costs for their most I/O-intensive workloads, regardless of I/O variability, helping to accelerate their decision to migrate more of their database workloads to AWS,” the company said in a statement.
Of course, the goal is to motivate customers to take on more workloads. But as more businesses seek to utilize vintage of the cloud more efficiently, a product like this could become appealing to CIOs who are becoming more cost-conscious.
But it’s essential to remember that it expenses more than the standard Aurora database, says Corey Quinn, chief cloud economist at The Duckbill Group, a consulting company that aids customers in lowering their AWS bill costs. “It’s an alternate pricing model. They charge more for this model as a baseline rate so it’s going to come down to the specifics of a given workload as to whether it’s a good idea to use it,” Quinn told TechCrunch.
It depends on the type of workload, AWS’s Channy Yun acknowledged in a blog post introducing the new version. “You can now confidently predict costs for your most I/O-intensive workloads, with up to 40 percent cost savings when your I/O spend exceeds 25 percent of your current Aurora database spend. If you are using Reserved Instances, you will see even greater cost savings,” he wrote.
It’s an advantage for clients with heavy workloads, according to Constellation Research founder and chief analyst Ray Wang. “Normally every time you read data that is not cached and then write data back to your MySQL or Postgres data, you incur an I/O charge,” he said. “This is designed to drop your pricing because they have found a more efficient way internally to handle this, and they’ve passed on the cost savings to customers as we enter an age of AI.”
Customers with data-intensive workloads, such as AI or seasonal e-commerce use cases, should find this to be very beneficial. Based on expected workloads, customers can add new workloads or switch within the management panel between the standard Aurora database and the I/O optimized version.
