Getting access to GPU compute on Azure

Question

Hello - I wanted to create a GPU compute instance to try out a few possible ideas, however I hadn't realised that Azure startup credits are not considered equivalent to a paid subscription!

This is the response that I received from the technical team: " 

We have been working with our Capacity Management team and in response we have received an update stating- 

You recently contacted us requesting access to the NC A100 v4 Series-series virtual machines through your free/benefit/sponsorship subscription. Unfortunately, we are unable to approve this request. Due to high demand for these graphics-enabled VM types, availability is limited for customers using free/benefit subscriptions. Please consider alternative VM types that may be suitable for your requirements or consider creating a new pay-as-you-go subscription to explore expanded access through a separate paid subscription. "

The whole point of getting on the MS startup scheme was to leverage Azure for difficult workloads. We also have AWS credits via Nvidia, but much preferred to try and get everything working in Azure :(

Answer 1

@IM

We have official documentation that now covers this. Details can be found on Startup GPU Cluster page.

The Startup GPU Cluster is a set of interconnected GPUs optimized and made available specifically for distributed training and fine-tuning. Startups can request access to this GPU cluster for short periods of time and use their Founders Hub credits, when available, to pay for it. As of January 2024, the cluster is a set of 500 NDmA100s, subject to change at a future date.

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