Cloud resources used by Cayosoft Guardian

Overview

When you connect an Azure subscription or AWS account to Cayosoft Guardian and create a recovery plan, Cayosoft Guardian automatically provisions cloud infrastructure on your behalf. This automation simplifies disaster recovery; however, because all resources are created in your own cloud environment, the associated costs are billed directly to your cloud account.

This article explains which Cayosoft Guardian features provision cloud resources, what types of resources are created, why they are required, and how they may impact your cloud costs.

Cayosoft Guardian is designed to be secure by default, cost-transparent, and simple to operate, with no hidden infrastructure or unexpected charges.

Before creating cloud connections or recovery plans, review pricing using your cloud provider’s official calculators and service pricing pages.

Resources provisioned in Microsoft Azure

When you enable Azure-based recovery, Guardian may provision the following resources in your subscription:

• Virtual machines - Used to host recovery workloads or replication components. Standard Azure VM pricing applies, and VMs are typically deallocated when not in use.
   
• Azure Bastion - Provides secure, browser-based RDP/SSH access without public IP addresses. Bastion is billed hourly while running.
   
• Virtual networks, subnets, and network security groups - Used to isolate and secure recovery environments. Core networking components are free; related services may incur additional costs.
   
• Managed disks and storage accounts - Used for VM disks, backups, and recovery snapshots. Charges are based on storage capacity and transactions.
   
• Azure Relay (select hybrid scenarios) - Used for secure connectivity to on-premises environments. Costs depend on usage and connection duration.
   

Resources provisioned in Amazon Web Services (AWS)

For AWS-based recovery plans, Cayosoft Guardian may provision the following resources:

• Amazon EC2 instances - Used to run recovery workloads. Costs depend on instance type, runtime, and pricing model.
   
• VPCs, subnets, and security groups - Provide network isolation and protection. Optional services such as NAT gateways or VPC endpoints may incur charges.
   
• EBS volumes and S3 buckets - Used for persistent storage, snapshots, and recovery metadata. Pricing is based on capacity and request volume.
   
• IAM roles - Used to grant Guardian least-privilege permissions. IAM roles themselves do not incur charges.
   

All AWS resources created by Cayosoft Guardian are tagged for visibility in AWS Cost Explorer and billing reports.

Managing cloud costs

Guardian provisions cloud resources only when you explicitly create a cloud connection and define a recovery plan. To keep costs predictable:

• Limit recovery plans to business-critical systems
• Review networking services such as Azure Bastion, NAT gateways, and Elastic IPs
• Use shutdown schedules for non-production recovery environments
• Monitor Cayosoft Guardian-tagged resources using cloud cost management tools:
  • Azure Cost Management
  • AWS Cost Explorer

Example: Azure recovery configuration

The following example illustrates a basic, default Azure recovery configuration created by Cayosoft Guardian. This scenario is intended to demonstrate the minimum set of cloud resources typically provisioned for a simple recovery plan.

• One Azure subscription connected to Cayosoft Guardian
• One recovery plan
• One or two domain controllers included in the plan
• No custom networking or advanced configuration
• Secure default settings

When this recovery plan is created, Guardian typically provisions the following Azure resources:

• One virtual network (VNet) with isolated subnets
• One Azure Bastion instance for secure RDP/SSH access
• One or more virtual machines for recovery workloads
• Managed disks associated with the recovery VMs
• Network security groups enforcing restricted access