Running a Windows EC2 instance, step by step
(Continued from my last post.)
- Install ElasticFox.
- Open ElasticFox (Tools | ElasticFox in Firefox).
- Click on the 'KeyPairs' tab and create a new keypair. Save it somewhere.
- Click to the 'AMIs and Instances' tab. Under 'Machine Images (AMIs)', enter ec2-public-windows in the search box and hit ENTER.
- You'll get a list of Windows machine images. Pick the appropriate one. You probably want ami-b53cd8dc, ec2-public-windows-images/Server2003r2-i386-anon-v1.01.manifest.xml. (This is different from the one I used in my last post, but I can't find that one via ElasticFox. Be careful which one you use as the SQL Server and Auth Services ones are more expensive.) Right click on it and select 'Launch Instances'.
- Leave all the options alone, making sure it is using the keypair you generated earlier.
- Once the instance is launched (shows up as 'running' rather than 'pending'), right-click on it and select 'Get Administrator Password'.
- Now you should be able to connect in to the instance using its public IP address with the Remote Desktop Client on Windows, or rdesktop on Linux/OS X. Log in as Administrator, with the password you just retrieved.
- Once you're done, shut the instance down by terminating it in ElasticFox, or by clicking Start | Windows Security in your remote desktop session, and selecting "Shut Down" on the menu in the window that pops up.