Solve: How to add an EBS volume to a Windows EC2 instance and configure it

This post is divided in two sections. In the first section you will see how to create an EBS volume and in the next section we will show you how to configure the EBS volume in windows instance.
Create EBS Volume

• Go to AWS Console > EC2
• In the left panel select “Volumes” .
• Once in the “Volume” screen select “Create Volume”
• In the “Create Volume” window specify the size of disk and the Availability Zone  in which you want the disk to be created.

Tip:- The disk should be in same AZ as your EC2 instance.

• Now in the left pane again select the “Volume” to see all your volumes.
• Select the volume you just created and after that in the upper menu click on “Actions” and select “Attach volume”
• In “Attach volume” window select the instance to which you want to attach the volume and click on “Attach”.

Configure EBS volume in Windows

• Login to your windows EC2 instance using RDP. Once inside the instance, from the Start menu go to  “Computer Management” as mentioned below.

Start > Control Panel > System and Security > Administrative Tools > Computer Management

• Click on Disk Management on the left pane.
• Here we can see the new disk but it’s still offline. Right click on the new disk and select “Online”.

• Once the disk is online right click again on the disk and select “Initialize Disk”.

• If disk is below 2TB, select MBR and click OK

• Finally right click on the pane where size is shown(refer image below). Select “New Simple Volume”

• Leave other options as default and click “Next” till you come to “Assign Drive Letter or Path”.  Here we have assigned the drive letter E .

• Leave everything else as default in next windows and click on finish.

• Now if we go to “This PC/ My computer” we should see the new disk.

So here we have attached an EBS volume to the Windows EC2 instance. Do let us know in comments section if you have any query.

Solved: How to check remote port status in windows server 2016 without telnet

Telnet was always a security risk as data transfer is not secure on it. Seems like Microsoft has now finally removed it from Windows Server 2016.

We generally use telnet to check if a port is open on the remote server. So, how to check it now without telnet?

Instead of telnet you can use powershell commands to check the connections.

Please follow below steps for details.
Search for Windows powershell and open its console in your Windows 2016 server.
Use “Test-NetConnection ” command to check the port status. Let’s check if ports 3389 is open.

 Test-NetConnection 10.0.1.15 -port 3389

If port is open you will get output like below.

ComputerName : 10.0.1.15
RemoteAddress : 10.0.1.15
RemotePort: 3389
InterfaceAlias : Ethernet 3
SourceAddress :  10.0.1.37
TcpTestSucceeded : True

Else, you will get failed message. In the below example we can see that the ping reply succeeded as ICMP is allowed, but “TcpTestSucceeded” is false as remote port 3389 is not open.

WARNING: TCP connect to 20.0.1.18:3389 failed
ComputerName : 20.0.1.18
RemoteAddress : 20.0.1.18
RemotePort : 3389
InterfaceAlias : Ethernet 3
SourceAddress : 10.0.1.37
PingSucceeded : True
PingReplyDetails (RTT) : 147 ms
TcpTestSucceeded : False


Tip:- Read this post for checking port in Linux without telnet .

Install vagrant and create VM on your windows laptop or desktop

In this post we will show you how to install vagrant in your laptop and start a Ubuntu Linux VM.
You will have to download these softwares and install them on your laptop.

• Download latest Virtualbox version
• Download latest Vagrant version
• Download Putty and PuttyGen

• Once they are downloaded.

First Install Virtual Box.  Just click on exe and follow installation instructions.
Next Install Vagrant. Just click on exe and follow installation instructions.
Putty and PuttyGen don’t need any installation, you can use them directly.
Once the pre-requisites are installed let’s move ahead.

• Open the windows command prompt. CMD
• Go to the directory where you will need the vagrant machines to be installed. e.g.

cd C:\users

• Once you are in desired directory create a new directory .

mkdir ProjectVagrantcd ProjectVagrant

• Create a new Vagrant File

vagrant init ubuntu/trusty64

• Below command will download the Ubuntu Trusty 64 OS image and create VM. Ensure you are connected to network.

vagrant up

• Setup ssh

vagrant ssh

Above command will give you IP, Port and Private key for the machine.

• Using putty you can connect to the machine. Add entries like below.

Hostname:- vagrant@127.0.0.1
Port :- 2222
Default password :- vagrant


If you want to login using the ssh key you will have to first convert the .pem key to .ppk. Follow this post on How to convert .pem key to .ppk and login to VM ?
That’s all in this post! Hope it’s useful for you. If you have any query please write in comments section.