4.1.2. Deploy Virtual Machines (VMs)

💡 First Principle: Efficiently deploying Virtual Machines requires leveraging automation and standardization to ensure consistency, reduce manual errors, and accelerate the provisioning of compute resources at scale.

Scenario: You need to deploy 50 new Virtual Machines for a development environment. These VMs must all have a specific operating system, pre-installed software, and adhere to a strict security baseline.

This task delves into the practical application of VM deployment. You'll explore how to:

• Create VMs from Azure Marketplace: Leverage pre-configured images for rapid deployment.
• Create VMs from Custom Images: Standardize deployments by embedding pre-installed software and security baselines.
• Deploy VMs using Azure Resource Manager (ARM) Templates: Define infrastructure as code for automated, consistent, and repeatable deployments.

Mastering these concepts is crucial for the AZ-104 exam, as it assesses your ability to implement various VM deployment strategies.

⚠️ Common Pitfall: Manually deploying each of the 50 VMs through the Azure Portal. This is extremely time-consuming, prone to human error, and results in inconsistent configurations.

Key Trade-Offs:

• Speed of a Single Deployment (Portal) vs. Scalability of Multiple Deployments (Templates/Images): The portal is fast for one VM. For many, the upfront effort of creating a custom image or ARM template pays off dramatically in speed and consistency.

Reflection Question: How do different VM deployment strategies (e.g., Marketplace images, custom images, ARM templates) fundamentally enable automation, standardization, and rapid provisioning of compute resources, ensuring consistency and reducing manual errors?