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Azure Virtual Machine

How to replicate Azure VM to a secondary Azure Region?

When it comes to Disaster recovery solutions, most of the time we select a different physical site as a backup/replication target. This is because if the primary site is down, we still have a copy of data safe on different site. We also can do the same with Azure VM. By using Azure Site Recovery Service, we can simply replicate existing Azure VM to a secondary Azure Region.

Let’s go ahead and see how we can do this.

For the configuration process, I will be using PowerShell as well as GUI. Therefore, please make sure you have an Azure PowerShell module installed. More info about it can find under https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/azure/install-az-ps?view=azps-3.8.0

Create an Azure VM to use as Source

I like to begin the configuration process by creating a Test VM. To do that,
1. Launch PowerShell console and connect to Azure using Connect-AzAccount
2. Then create a new resource group using,

New-AzResourceGroup -Name REBELRG1 -Location “East US”

Azure resource group for Source Azure VM

In the above, REBELRG1 is the resource group name and its created-in East US Azure region.

3. The next step is to create a new virtual network under REBELRG1 resource group.

$vmsubnet = New-AzVirtualNetworkSubnetConfig -Name vmsubnet -AddressPrefix “10.0.2.0/24”
New-AzVirtualNetwork -Name REBELVN1 -ResourceGroupName REBELRG1 -Location “East US” -AddressPrefix “10.0.0.0/16” -Subnet $vmsubnet

Azure virtual network for source

In the above, REBELVN1 is the new virtual network name. It has 10.0.0.0/16 address space. It also has a new subnet 10.0.2.0/24 (vmsubnet) for virtual machines.

4. As the next step of the configuration, I am going to create a new virtual machine under REBELRG1 resource group. This will be used for testing purposes.

$mylogin = Get-Credential
New-AzVm -ResourceGroupName REBELRG1 -Name “REBELTVM01” -Location “East US” -VirtualNetworkName “REBELVN1” -SubnetName “vmsubnet” -addressprefix 10.0.2.0/24 -PublicIpAddressName “REBELVM01IP1” -OpenPorts 3389 -Image win2019datacenter -Size Standard_D2s_v3 -Credential $mylogin

Create Azure VM

In the above, I am creating a virtual machine called REBELTVM01 in East US Azure region. It is running windows server 2019 data center edition. I have specified it using -Image parameter. It also using Standard_D2s_v3 vm size. For networking, it uses REBELVN1 virtual network and subnet 10.0.2.0/24.

5. Then I log in to the VM and created a folder and a file to use later for testing.

New-Item -Path ‘C:\REBELTest’ -ItemType Directory
New-Item -Path ‘C:\REBELTest\Test1.txt’ -ItemType File

Create test files for Azure replication testing [Read more…] about How to replicate Azure VM to a secondary Azure Region?

Step-by-Step Guide: Create Azure Windows Virtual Machine from a Snapshot (PowerShell Guide)

Virtual Machine Snapshots are the quickest way to recover a virtual machine from a disaster. Snapshot is a copy of the virtual machines’ disk file at a given point of time. There are situations where we may need to get certain data out from snapshot without restoring a complete virtual machine. The best way to do that is to create a virtual machine from the snapshot and then retrieve the relevant data. The same method also can use to test application upgrades or risky changes without affecting production servers. In this demo, I am going to demonstrate how we can create an Azure windows virtual machine from a snapshot.

For the configuration process, I will be using PowerShell. Therefore, please make sure you have an Azure PowerShell module installed. More info about it available on this link.

As part of the configuration, I am going to do following,

1. Create a new resource group
2. Create a new virtual network
3. Create Azure windows virtual machine
4. Log in to the new virtual machine and create few test files
5. Create snapshot
6. Create another virtual machine using the snapshot
7. Log in to this new Azure windows virtual machine and verify it has the test files created in original VM.

Create new Azure windows virtual machine

Let’s start the configuration process by creating a new resource group.

1. Launch PowerShell console and connect to Azure using Connect-AzAccount as Global Administrator
2. Then create a new resource group using,

New-AzResourceGroup -Name REBELRG1 -Location “East US”

create new azure resource group

In the above, REBELRG1 is the resource group names and East US is the Azure region.

3. The next step is to create a new virtual network under REBELRG1 resource group.

$vmsubnet = New-AzVirtualNetworkSubnetConfig -Name vmsubnet -AddressPrefix “10.0.2.0/24”

New-AzVirtualNetwork -Name REBELVN1 -ResourceGroupName REBELRG1 -Location “East US” -AddressPrefix “10.0.0.0/16” -Subnet $vmsubnet

create new azure virtual network

In the above, REBELVN1 is the new virtual network name. It has 10.0.0.0/16 address space. It also has a new subnet 10.0.2.0/24 (vmsubnet) for virtual machines

4. As the next step of the configuration, I am going to create a new virtual machine under REBELRG1 resource group. This will be used for testing purposes.

$mylogin = Get-Credential

New-AzVm -ResourceGroupName REBELRG1 -Name “REBELTVM01” -Location “East US” -VirtualNetworkName “REBELVN1” -SubnetName “vmsubnet” -addressprefix 10.0.2.0/24 -PublicIpAddressName “REBELVM01IP1” -OpenPorts 3389 -Image win2019datacenter -Size Standard_D2s_v3 -Credential $mylogin

create new Azure windows virtual machine

In the above, I am creating a virtual machine called REBELTVM01 in East US Azure region. It is running windows server 2019 data center edition. I have specified it using -Image parameter. It also using Standard_D2s_v3 vm size. For networking, it uses REBELVN1 virtual network and subnet 10.0.2.0/24. [Read more…] about Step-by-Step Guide: Create Azure Windows Virtual Machine from a Snapshot (PowerShell Guide)

Step-by-Step Guide: Control Inbound Internet traffic with Azure Firewall DNAT (PowerShell Guide)

I have a web server running in my on-premises network. I like to allow access to it from the internet via TCP port 443. To do that, I need to create two types of rules in my edge firewall. I need a NAT (Network Address Translation) rule to map a public IP address to the private IP address of the webserver. I also need an ACL rule to allow only relevant traffic (TCP 443). This ensures the traffic to web server from the public is protecting via edge firewall. In Azure, we can use the same topology to filter inbound internet traffic. For that, we have to use Azure Firewall Destination Network Address Translation (Azure Firewall DNAT). This is doing the same thing what NAT rule does but Microsoft calls it as DNAT. In this demo, I am going to demonstrate how to set up Azure Firewall and how to use it to filter incoming internet traffic.

Azure infrastructure setup

In my demo environment, I have two virtual networks.

• EUSFWVnet1 – This network hosts the Azure firewall.
• EUSWorkVnet1 – This virtual network is the production network. This is where I create VMs.

The above two networks are connected using Azure VNet Peering method. With VNet peering, virtual networks are connected via the Azure backbone network. If we compare this with on-premises network, it is similar to the connection between your local network and edge firewall.

So, in this setup, I am going to allow RDP access to a virtual machine in EUSWorkVnet1 over the internet via Azure Firewall.

For the configuration process, I will be using PowerShell. Therefore, please make sure you have an Azure PowerShell module installed. More info about it can find under https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/azure/install-az-ps?view=azps-3.8.0

Setup Resource Group

The first step of the configuration is to create a new resource group. Both virtual networks and other services will be using the same resource group.
To do that,
1. Launch PowerShell console and connect to Azure using Connect-AzAccount
2. Create a new resource group using New-AzResourceGroup -Name REBELRG1 -Location “East US”. Here REBELRG1 is the resource group name and East US is the location.

setup azure resource group

Setup Azure Firewall Network

The next step is to create a new virtual network for Azure Firewall under REBELRG1 resource group.

$fwsubn1 = New-AzVirtualNetworkSubnetConfig -Name “AzureFirewallSubnet” -AddressPrefix 10.0.0.0/24
$eusfwvnet = New-AzVirtualNetwork -Name EUSFWVnet1 -ResourceGroupName REBELRG1 -Location “East US” -AddressPrefix 10.0.0.0/16 -Subnet $fwsubn1

EUSFWVnet1’s address space is 10.0.0.0/16. It is a class B IP address range. We have one subnet under it. AzureFirewallSubnet (10.0.0.0/24) will be used by Azure Firewall. Azure firewall only can be created in a subnet with name ‘AzureFirewallSubnet’

setup azure firewall subnet

Setup Production Network

The next step of the configuration is to set up a virtual network for production workloads.

$worksubn1 = New-AzVirtualNetworkSubnetConfig -Name WorkSubnet -AddressPrefix 10.2.0.0/24
$workvnet = New-AzVirtualNetwork -Name EUSWorkVnet1 -ResourceGroupName REBELRG1 -Location “East US” -AddressPrefix 10.2.0.0/16 -Subnet $worksubn1

EUSWorkVnet1’s address space is 10.2.0.0/16. We have one subnet under it called WorkSubnet. This is the subnet we will use for the virtual machine.

setup azure production network [Read more…] about Step-by-Step Guide: Control Inbound Internet traffic with Azure Firewall DNAT (PowerShell Guide)

Step-by-Step Guide: How to setup an Azure load balancer? (PowerShell Guide)

In my previous blog post https://www.rebeladmin.com/2020/01/step-step-guide-setup-azure-load-balancer/, I explained how to setup an Azure load balancer. In that post, I used GUI method to set it up. In this post I am going to show how we can set azure load balancer using Azure PowerShell. 

In this demo, I am going to set up two virtual servers with IIS on it. Then I am going to set up Azure load balancer and load balance the web service access for external connections over TCP port 80. 

To do that I will need to do the following tasks,

1. Setup new resource group

2. Setup two new windows VM

3. Setup IIS with sample web page

4. Create Azure load balancer

5. Create a backend pool

6. Create health probes

7. Create load balancer rule

8. Testing

For the configuration process, I will be using Azure PowerShell. Therefore, please make sure you have Azure PowerShell module installed. More info about it can find under https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/azure/install-az-ps?view=azps-2.6.0

Setup new resource group

1. Launch PowerShell console and connect to Azure using Connect-AzAccount

2. Then create a new resource group using,

New-AzResourceGroup -Name REBELRG1 -Location "East US"

In the above, REBELRG1 is the resource group name and East US is the resource group location.

Setup two new windows VM

1. In this demo, I am going to use two back end servers. Before VM setup, let's go ahead and create a new virtual network. 

$vmsubnet  = New-AzVirtualNetworkSubnetConfig -Name vmsubnet -AddressPrefix "10.0.2.0/24"

New-AzVirtualNetwork -Name REBELVN1 -ResourceGroupName REBELRG1 -Location "East US" -AddressPrefix "10.0.0.0/16" -Subnet $vmsubnet

In the above, REBELVN1 is the new virtual network name. It has 10.0.0.0/16 address space. It also has a new subnet 10.0.2.0/24 (vmsubnet) for virtual machines.

2. Then I need to create a new availability set. To add back end servers to load balancer, those VMs need to be in the same availability set. 

New-AzAvailabilitySet -Location "East US" -Name "REBELAS1" -ResourceGroupName "REBELRG1" -Sku aligned -PlatformFaultDomainCount 2 -PlatformUpdateDomainCount 2

In above REBELAS1 is the availability group name. More info about scale sets can found here https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machine-scale-sets/availability

3. As the next step of the configuration, I am going to create two new virtual machines under REBELRG1 resource group. 

$mylogin = Get-Credential

New-AzVm -ResourceGroupName REBELRG1 -Name "REBELTVM01" -Location "East US" -VirtualNetworkName "REBELVN1" -SubnetName "vmsubnet" -addressprefix 10.0.2.0/24 -PublicIpAddressName "REBELTVM01IP1" -AvailabilitySetName "REBELAS1" -OpenPorts 3389,80 -Image win2019datacenter -Size Standard_D2s_v3 -Credential $mylogin

New-AzVm -ResourceGroupName REBELRG1 -Name "REBELTVM02" -Location "East US" -VirtualNetworkName "REBELVN1" -SubnetName "vmsubnet" -addressprefix 10.0.2.0/24 -PublicIpAddressName "REBELTVM02IP1" -AvailabilitySetName "REBELAS1" -OpenPorts 3389,80 -Image win2019datacenter -Size Standard_D2s_v3 -Credential $mylogin

In the above, I am creating two virtual machines called REBELTVM01 & REBELTVM02. It is running windows server 2019 data center edition. I have specified it using -Image parameter. It also using Standard_D2s_v3 vm size. For networking, It uses REBELVN1 virtual network and subnet 10.0.2.0/24. [Read more…] about Step-by-Step Guide: How to setup an Azure load balancer? (PowerShell Guide)

Step-by-Step Guide: Crete Azure VM using Managed Image (PowerShell Guide)

Each organization has different standards when it comes to server/desktop provisioning. These standards change based on the nature of the business, compliances, server/desktop role and so on. By keeping the customized OS image simplifies the provisioning process as well as prevent configuration errors. In the local environment, we can do this simply using WDS, System Centre or other 3rd party solutions. But what if need to do the same in Azure environment ?

In this blog post, I am going to demonstrate how to create a managed image in Azure and how to use it to deploy Azure VM. 

For the configuration process, I will be using PowerShell. Therefore, please make sure you have Azure PowerShell module installed. More info about it can find under https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/powershell/azure/install-az-ps?view=azps-2.6.0

Let's go ahead and start the configuration process by creating a new resource group. 

1. Launch PowerShell console and connect to Azure using Connect-AzAccount

2. Then create a new resource group using,

New-AzResourceGroup -Name REBELRG -Location "East US"

In the above, REBELRG is the resource group name and East US is the resource group location.

3. The next step is to create a new virtual network.

$vmsubnet  = New-AzVirtualNetworkSubnetConfig -Name vmsubnet -AddressPrefix "10.0.2.0/24"

New-AzVirtualNetwork -Name REBELVN1 -ResourceGroupName REBELRG -Location "East US" -AddressPrefix "10.0.0.0/16" -Subnet $vmsubnet

In the above, REBELVN1 is the new virtual network name. It has 10.0.0.0/16 address space. It also has a new subnet 10.0.2.0/24 (vmsubnet) for virtual machines. 

[Read more…] about Step-by-Step Guide: Crete Azure VM using Managed Image (PowerShell Guide)