Greetings,

Does anyone know of a company or service from which I could rent an inexpensive (or free) Linux virtual machine? I looked into getting one via Microsoft Azure, but they are expensive to the point that I could buy a cheap desktop for considerably less money.

My needs are not extreme. Specifically, I need a VM I can ssh into that 1) is persistent, i.e., the machine will persist (files, etc.) between logins; and 2) I can be root on. In addition, I would need root access to a PostgreSQL database. I would prefer the OS to be the latest Ubuntu LTS, but I'm not super particular.

I don't need much computing power, but I will need at least 250 GB of storage and preferably 1 TB. I will be working with large files, so would like at least 16 GB of RAM.

I realize I could put a VM on my own computer, but for my purposes, I would prefer a physically separate box.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Mark

I have no personal experience with it, but I've heard good things about DigitalOcean.

A web search for "linux server rental" will turn up a number of articles and reviews (and self-promotions).

Renting a cloud server you will pay whatever they charge. It may not cost much per month but over a relatively short time it adds up to quite a bit.

Running your own server even in a VM would be less expensive long term.
The biggest advantage (and disadvantage) to a cloud server is the ease of access from the internet.

Advantage because anyone can access it, disadvantage because all the hackers can access it and try to break in.

Either way if you want to have a hostname for access you will have to pay for the dns service to have an accessible hostname with a domain of choice.

If your ISP provides you with a valid internet address at your gateway router then doing it yourself makes more sense to me as long as the ISP allows you to have a server on their service. If, OTOH, your ISP is only giving you a private IP on your gateway then definitely the hosted VM is a better choice.

Why don't you simply buy an affordable desktop computer.
Then install Ubuntu (free).
Then install KVM virtual machine (free).
Then undertake your jobs on that virtual machine?

You wouldn't need to remotely access the machine because its right next to you. And you own the machine.

and why do you need VM at all? just buy a desktop as it was suggested and use.

Bolded/underlined something for emphasis only. My question would be "why??" You're not gaining anything by having a physically separate box, especially if it's for learning/demo/proof-of-concept purposes.

You could load VirtualBox on your Windows system, and have everything you've listed above, for free. Just doesn't make sense to get another system or rent a hosted system for the very little that you seem to need.