EC2 — Excessively Complicated Compute
SWA's Premium Virtual Machine Service
SWA EC2 Pricing
$999/hour
* Instances may or may not start. No refunds.
💡 Real Alternatives That Actually Work
Since SWA EC2 is more of an art project than a service, here are actual cloud compute providers that will run your applications without requiring a philosophy degree to understand the pricing.
Contabo
When You Shop Cloud on Wish.com
Servers assembled by unpaid interns using recycled Pentium 4s. Storage is just USB sticks hot-glued together. Network packets delivered by carrier pigeon. But hey, it's cheap!
Reality: Actually decent for dev/test, just don't run production here
Hetzner
German Engineering (Some Assembly Required)
Like buying cloud from IKEA - great price, but you'll spend 6 hours assembling it with an Allen key. Instructions only in German. Missing critical screws.
Reality: Honestly amazing price/performance if you can handle the DIY
Vultr
Fast Fashion for Fast Compute
The Zara of cloud - looks premium but falls apart after 3 deploys. Trendy today, deprecated tomorrow. Customer support via Instagram DM only.
Reality: Good middle ground, decent global coverage
DigitalOcean
Developer-Friendly Cloud Platform
✅ Pros
- Simple, predictable pricing
- Excellent documentation
- Great developer experience
- Managed databases included
❌ Cons
- Limited enterprise features
- Fewer regions than AWS
Linode
Simple, Affordable, Accessible
✅ Pros
- Straightforward pricing
- Good performance/price ratio
- Excellent customer support
- Now part of Akamai
❌ Cons
- Fewer advanced features
- Limited managed services
AWS EC2
The Original Cloud Compute
✅ Pros
- Massive global infrastructure
- Every feature imaginable
- Deep integration with AWS services
- Industry standard
❌ Cons
- Complex pricing
- Steep learning curve
- Easy to overspend
- Requires expertise
Google Cloud Compute
Google-Scale Infrastructure
✅ Pros
- Live migration technology
- Sustained use discounts
- Custom machine types
- Strong in AI/ML
❌ Cons
- Complex like AWS
- Fewer regions
- Steeper learning curve
Hetzner
German Engineering, Unbeatable Prices
✅ Pros
- Incredible price/performance
- European data centers
- No surprise billing
- Dedicated servers available
❌ Cons
- Primarily European locations
- Less hand-holding
- No managed services
Azure Virtual Machines
Microsoft's Cloud Answer
✅ Pros
- Great for Windows workloads
- Hybrid cloud capabilities
- Enterprise agreements
- Active Directory integration
❌ Cons
- Confusing portal
- Complex pricing
- Frequent service names changes
OVH
European Cloud Leader
✅ Pros
- Anti-DDoS included
- European data sovereignty
- Competitive pricing
- No ingress/egress fees
❌ Cons
- Support can be slow
- Less documentation in English
- Fewer managed services
Oracle Cloud
Always Free Tier That's Actually Good
✅ Pros
- Generous always-free tier
- 4 ARM CPUs + 24GB RAM free
- Good for databases
- Competitive pricing
❌ Cons
- It's Oracle
- Aggressive sales team
- Complex pricing
- Limited community
Contabo
When Price is Everything
✅ Pros
- Unbeatable prices
- Lots of resources for the money
- Good for development
- European company
❌ Cons
- Oversold infrastructure
- Variable performance
- Limited locations
- Basic support
💰 Pricing Comparison
Entry-level VM pricing across providers. Prices as of 2024, subject to change when Mercury is in retrograde.
| Provider | CPU | RAM | Storage | Price | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| SWA EC2 | ??? vCPU | Random GB | Maybe TB | $999/hour | Doesn't actually work |
| Vultr | 1 vCPU | 1 GB | 25 GB SSD | $6/month | Regular performance |
| DigitalOcean | 1 vCPU | 1 GB | 25 GB SSD | $6/month | Premium Intel/AMD |
| Hetzner | 2 vCPU | 2 GB | 40 GB SSD | €3.79/month | Shared ARM |
| AWS EC2 | 2 vCPU | 1 GB | EBS extra | ~$15/month | t4g.micro |
| Linode | 1 vCPU | 1 GB | 25 GB SSD | $5/month | Shared CPU |
🚀 Migrating from SWA EC2
If you're one of the zero people successfully running workloads on SWA EC2, congratulations on defying physics! Here's how to migrate to a real provider:
- Pick literally any other provider - They all work better
- Sign up - Most offer free credits (real money, not Zimbabwe dollars)
- Deploy your app - It will actually run this time
- Celebrate - You're free from SWA's chaos
🤝 Featured Partners
Vultr Cloud
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- $2499/month
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