We often get asked which servers offer the best performance and value for analytics. To answer, we’ve compared Azure (representing the “US clouds”) with Hetzner in a detailed analysis.
From the Azure documentation available here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/virtual-machines/sizes/overview
… the virtual machines available inside Azure are classified in 9 different “Series”:
| VM Series | vCPU Range | Memory (GB) | Purpose |
| A-series | 1 – 8 | 2 – 64 | Entry-level, dev/test, small apps |
| B-series | 2 – 32 | 1 – 128 | Burstable, cost-efficient workloads |
| D-series | 2 – 96 | 8 – 384 | General-purpose, business apps |
| E-series | 2 – 128 | 16 – 672 | Memory-intensive apps |
| F-series | 2 – 64 | 4 – 256 | Compute-intensive workloads |
| L-series | 4 – 80 | 32 – 512 | Storage-intensive workloads |
| M-series | 8 – 416 | 192 – 11,400 | Extremely high-memory workloads |
| N-series | 6 – 96 | 56 – 672 | GPU-based tasks (AI, ML, graphics) |
| H-series | 2 – 120 | 8 – 1200 | High-performance computing (HPC) |
Here are the processors available in each of these series:
| VM Series | Processor | vCPU Range | Memory Range (GB) | Key Features |
| A-series | Intel Xeon E5 family (E5-2673 v3 and v4), Intel Xeon Platinum 8370C and 8272CL, Intel Xeon 8171M (Ice Lake) | 1-8 | 2 – 64 | Budget-friendly, entry-level, consistent CPU performance |
| B-series | AMD EPYC 7763v (Genoa) and 7452, Intel Xeon Platinum 8473C (Sapphire Rapids) or 8370C (Ice Lake) | 2 – 32 | 1 – 128 | Burstable, credit-based CPU performance model |
| D-series | Intel Xeon Platinum 8573C (Emerald Rapids) and 8272CL (Cascade Lake), AMD EPYC 7763 (Milan), AMD’s 4th Generation EPYC™ 9004 | 2 – 96 | 8 – 384 | High CPU-to-memory ratio for general-purpose workloads |
| E-series | Intel Xeon Platinum 8370C (Ice Lake), AMD EPYC 7763 (Milan), AMD’s fourth Generation EPYC™ 9004 | 2 – 128 | 16 – 672 | Memory-optimized, great for relational databases and in-memory analytics |
| F-series | Intel Xeon Platinum 8272CL (Cascade Lake) | 2 – 64 | 4 – 256 | Compute-intensive workloads with a high CPU-to-memory ratio |
| L-series | Intel Xeon Platinum 8370C (Ice Lake), AMD EPYC 7763v (Milan). | 4 – 80 | 32 – 512 | Optimized for storage-intensive workloads with high IOPS |
| H-series | Intel Xeon Platinum 8168, 4th Gen AMD EPYC 7551 (Naples), AMD EPYC 7V12 (Genoa) , AMD EPYC 9V33X (Genoa-X), AMD EPYC™ 7V73X (Milan-X), AMD EPYC 7V12 | 2 – 120 | 8 – 1200 | High-performance computing (HPC), with enhanced interconnects for fast data |
If we search the performances for each of these processors on cpubenchmark.net, we get (the higher the “Single thread rating”, the better the CPU):
| Processor | Single Thread Rating | Clock Speed [GHz] | URL |
| Intel Xeon E5-2673 v3 | 1,738 | 2.4 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+E5-2673+v3+%40+2.40GHz&id=2606 |
| Intel Xeon E5-2673 v4 | 2,107 | 2.3 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+E5-2673+v4+%40+2.30GHz&id=2888 |
| Intel Xeon Platinum 8575C | 2,593 | 4.0 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+Platinum+8575C&id=6173 |
| Intel Xeon Platinum 8370C (Ice Lake) | 2,474 | 3.5 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+Platinum+8375C+%40+2.90GHz&id=4486 |
| Intel Xeon Platinum 8272CL (Cascade Lake) | 2,386 | 3.0 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+Platinum+8275CL+%40+3.00GHz&id=3624 |
| Intel Xeon 8171M (Ice Lake) | 2,222 | 2.6 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+Platinum+8171M+%40+2.60GHz&id=3220 |
| AMD EPYC 7763v (Genoa) | 2,517 | 2.45 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+EPYC+7763&id=4207 |
| AMD EPYC 7452 | 1,995 | 2.35 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+EPYC+7452&id=3600 |
| Intel Xeon Platinum 8280L | 2,029 | 2.7 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+Platinum+8280+%40+2.70GHz&id=3662 |
| AMD EPYC 7551 | 1,766 | 2.0 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+EPYC+7551&id=3089 |
| AMD EPYC 7V12 (7443) | 2,907 | 2.9 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+EPYC+7443&id=4708 |
| Intel Xeon Platinum 8168 | 2,092 | 2.7 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=Intel+Xeon+Platinum+8168+%40+2.70GHz&id=3111 |
| 4th Gen AMD EPYC 7Hx (HBv4) | 2022 | 2.6 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+EPYC+7H12&id=3618&cpuCount=2 |
| AMD EPYC 9V33X (Genoa-X) (9334) | 2,367 | 2.7 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+EPYC+9334&id=5519 |
Inside Azure, the processor with the highest speed is thus AMD EPYC 7V12 (7443) with a score of 2907: These processors are only available inside the HBv2-series.
We’ll now make a pricing simulation for a virtual machines based on a the H series.
We start here: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/vm-selector/
Here are the configuration steps for the Wizard on Azure:
1. Select the “H series” for high performance computing load:
2. We want a machine with at least 32 cores and 64 GB of RAM:
3. We want a machine with a fast SSD for the OS:
4. We want to store around 4 TB of data (same capacity as the machines on Hetzner): When we select this size, we can only get a SSD with an access-speed of 750 Mbyte/sec (i.e. quite slow). No way to get better speed without exploding the budget.
5. The OS on the machine should be Windows:
6. We want our machine in Europe:
We finally arrive at a proposition from the Azure-Wizard for some machine based on HB60rs series.
The monthly price for the machine (without the SSD storage) is 2647 €: See screenshot:
We tried to make many different other simulations that would allow us to get another type of instance with some CPUs. Actually, when you click ‘+ View more’ , you can see more machines with really bad CPU’s (AMD EPYC 7002 and 7003). The only instance that is slightly better that the others is from the series HC44rs that has an Intel Xeon 8168 processor (you can see the exact processors when clicking on the “View details”) with a performance score of 2092.
In addition to the machine cost, the monthly storage cost is around 330 €:
Thus, the total monthly cost for the best Azure machine is 2647 + 330 = 2977 €/month
Let’s now compare the best&most efficient machine from Azure to 2 machines readily available on Hetzner: AX102 and EX101. Since the machine from Fiberklaar is the AX101 (an older version from AX102), we’ll also add it to the comparison.
Here is a table with the 3 processors from Hetzner:
| Processor | Single Thread Rating | Clock Speed | URL |
| AX101 AMD Ryzen 9 5950X | 3469 | 3.4 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?cpu=AMD+Ryzen+9+5950X&id=3862 |
| AX102 AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D | 4150 | 4.2 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?id=5234&cpu=AMD+Ryzen+9+7950X3D |
| EX101 Intel Core i9-13900 | 4330 | 5 | https://www.cpubenchmark.net/cpu.php?id=5176&cpu=Intel+Core+i9-13900 |
Here are the specs for the AX102: https://www.hetzner.com/dedicated-rootserver/matrix-ax/
Here are the specs for the EX101: https://www.hetzner.com/dedicated-rootserver/matrix-ex/
Here is the final comparison table between Hetzner and Azure:
| Best machine on Azure | AX101 | AX102 | EX101 | |
| CPU name | AMD EPYC 7551 | AMD Ryzen 9 5950X | AMD Ryzen 9 7950X3D | Intel Core i9-13900 |
| CPU Speed | 2092 | 3469 | 4150 | 4330 |
| RAM | 200 GB | 128 GB | 128 GB | 64 GB |
| Storage capacity | 4 TB | 4 TB | 4 TB | 4 TB |
| Storage Speed | 750 MB/sec | 2000 MB/sec | 2000 MB/sec | 2000 MB/sec |
| Monthly Price | 2977 € | 102 € | 104 € | 84 € |
We recommend to use the EX101 server on Hetzner because it is:
- 22.8 times cheaper than the best available Azure server
- 2.45 times faster in terms of CPU than the best available Azure server
- 2.66 times faster in terms of Storage-Access-Speed (to read & write data on SSD) than the best available Azure server
- The Hetzner server has enough RAM (64GB) to do everything and anything with TIMi.
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