However, the new drop in the price of Windows On-Demand EC2 instances suggests that Amazon is at least partially moving away from “encouraging” customers to follow a reserved instance model.

The tools have been updated for the new Windows Server 2012 R2 instance. Amazon EC2 pricing is listed at this page.

Developers and businesses with Windows Server applications can take advantage of 750 hours of Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) Micro Instance usage per month, at no charge for a one year ...

After earlier detailing needed planning, Brien goes to the next step: an in-place upgrade of the Windows Server OS as it relates to AWS EC2.

Windows Server on Micro Instance – Please don’t even attempt it! Though AWS added Windows Server to the free tier and it may be tempting to launch Windows instances running as Micro Instances ...

Brien demonstrates the process of upgrading AWS EC2 instances running Windows Server 2012 R2 to newer OSes.

Amazon allows organisations to consume up to 750 hours of EC2 (Elastic Compute Cloud) per month for a year at no charge. This offer has now been extended to included Windows Server instances.