Azure D-Series VM Prices Go Down

I’m optimizing a SQL Server OLTP mirrored database hosted on an Azure VM. After load testing, it was clear that CPU is the primary resource constraint so I suggested an upgrade to a higher A-series machine alongside other reconfiguration and storage changes. Meanwhile, I’ve noticed that starting in October, the D-Series pricing goes down. Moreover, D-series include a SSD temporary drive to host the temp database and buffer extensions. And, according to Microsoft, D-series have “60% faster processors than the A-series”. In this case, to save the customer money, I recommended a D-Series VM with less cores than the A-series VM upgrade I had in mind.