Microsoft’s New Azure VM Migration Tool Boosts Uptime and Disaster Recovery

Key Takeaways:

• The Azure VM Regional to Zonal Move feature allows regional VMs to be moved to zonal configurations, improving application resiliency and ensuring a 99.99% uptime SLA.
• The feature performs a thorough analysis of dependent resources and validates SKU availability, providing alternative recommendations if needed.
• Microsoft has added the capability to move over 250 VMs in a single operation.

Microsoft has announced that the “Azure VM Regional to Zonal Move” feature is now generally available for commercial customers. This new capability enables seamless transitions of virtual machines (VMs) from regional to zonal configurations within the same region.

“This capability allows you to move your existing regional VMs into availability zones that were not available when the VM was created in your region of choice, and increase application resiliency and availability supported by 99.99% uptime SLA for virtual machines, that have two or more instances deployed across two or more availability zones,” Microsoft explained.

How does the Azure VM Regional to Zonal Move feature work?

The Azure VM Regional to Zonal Move feature starts by analyzing the VM to identify dependent resources such as VNET, Public IPs, and NICs. It then creates a copy of the source VM and its disk in the chosen availability zone.

Additionally, this feature shuts down the source VM while keeping its configuration intact to ensure a seamless rollback experience and prevent data loss. Microsoft notes that IT admins may experience a few minutes of downtime during the move process.

What are the key enhancements with this release?

Microsoft has added a built-in validation mechanism to check if the desired SKU is available in the target zone. If the selected SKU isn’t available, the system suggests alternative SKUs that can be used instead. Microsoft has also added support for moving over 250 virtual machines (VMs) in a single operation using Azure CLI, Azure PowerShell, and Azure SDKs.

The new VM Regional to Zonal Move feature is now available in all Azure public regions that support Availability Zones, including Azure China (China North 3) and Azure Govt (US Gov Virginia).

Going forward, Microsoft will introduce a feature that allows organizations to move regional VMs within an Availability Set to VMSS Flex with zonal configuration in order to enhance fault tolerance and scalability. VMSS (Virtual Machine Scale Sets) is an Azure service that enables customers to create and manage groups of identical VMs.

Last but not least, Microsoft will add the ability for administrators to move virtual machines between availability zones. This feature will help organizations improve disaster recovery and load balancing.