AWS Quick Starts - AWS Enterprise Accelerator

Microsoft Servers on AWS

Deploy Lync, Exchange, SharePoint, SQL Server, WAP & AD FS with one click

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Quick Start architecture for Microsoft productivity servers on the AWS Cloud


The AWS Cloud provides a suite of infrastructure services that help you deploy Microsoft workloads for your test or production use on AWS. This Quick Start deploys five popular business productivity servers from Microsoft — SharePoint Server, Lync Server, Exchange Server, SQL Server, and Web Application Proxy with AD FS — with a single click, in a highly available Multi-AZ architecture on AWS.

By deploying this Quick Start, you can take advantage of the email, collaboration, communications, and directory features provided by the Microsoft servers along with the flexibility and security of AWS. The advantages of running Microsoft servers on AWS include add-on compatibility, scalability, agility, cost, optimization, reliability, and high availability.

This Quick Start is part of a set of AWS Enterprise Accelerator offerings, which help enterprise customers rapidly develop key capabilities for cloud projects.

See the complete Quick Start catalog.

  • What you'll build

    • Amazon Virtual Private Cloud (Amazon VPC) to provide a private, isolated section of the AWS Cloud for your servers and services
    • Use of two Availability Zones for high availability and disaster recovery
    • Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 with Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS) for user authentication and authorization, and Remote Desktop Gateway (RD Gateway) for remote Windows administration
    • NAT gateways deployed to public subnets to provide outbound Internet access for instances in the private subnets
    • SQL Server 2012 or 2014 instances configured in a Windows Server Failover Cluster (WSFC) for database services
    • Paired Lync Server 2013 Standard Edition front-end servers and (optionally) two edge servers
    • Exchange Server 2013 environment that supports 250 mailboxes; this includes two multi-role servers with mailbox and client access server (CAS) roles, and (optionally) two edge transport servers
    • SharePoint Server 2016 farm with two web front-end servers and two application servers based on a traditional or streamlined topology
    • Web Application Proxy with Active Directory Federation Services (AD FS) servers


    For details, see the Quick Start deployment guide.

  • Deployment details

    Deploy Microsoft productivity servers into your AWS account in three easy steps:

    1. Prepare your AWS account.
    2. Launch the Quick Start and customize its configuration. The deployment takes 3-4 hours.
    3. Test the servers on AWS and create users and content.
       

    To customize your deployment, you can choose a traditional or streamlined topology for your SharePoint Server farm, include Office Online Servers, include edge servers for Lync and Exchange, and choose the version of SQL Server you'd like to deploy. See the Quick Start deployment guide for a full list of parameters and options.

  • Cost and licenses

    You are responsible for the cost of the AWS services used while running this Quick Start reference deployment. The cost will depend on your Quick Start deployment configuration. There is no additional cost for using the Quick Start.

    The Quick Start launches the Amazon Machine Image (AMI) for Windows Server 2012 R2 and includes the license for the Windows Server 2012 R2 operating system.

    By default, this Quick Start installs the free trial versions of the Microsoft business productivity servers. To use these servers beyond the trial period, you must obtain licenses from Microsoft. For production environments, you can license Microsoft server products through the Microsoft License Mobiility through Software Assurance program, and provide your own product key after deployment. For development and test environments, you can leverage your existing MSDN licenses using Amazon EC2 Dedicated Hosts or Dedicated Instances. For details, see the MSDN on AWS page.