>You are probably right for big, cheap SSDs and fast networking GCE likely is the place to be. It's a newer stack. But this article fails to prove that, and it provides a lot of FUD. "Local SSD storage is only available via the i2 instances family which are the most expensive instances on AWS" - He didn't say BIG. And gp2 is actually pretty good in my opinion. (Also, you missed the now legacy hi1 instance in your list.)

Not sure what you mean by "prove"...for instances with "large" (say over 250 GB) local SSD you have I2 and X1 on AWS, both very expensive (and I don't see H1 on https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/instance-types/ any more). He specifically gave what SSD sizes he uses (800 and 375 GB) so the implication is that's what he needs. It is a bit sad that to get the equivalent storage performance of a $200 Samsung 850 Pro SSD you need to spend thousands a year on AWS, and for the equivalent of a higher end PCI-e enterprise SSD, I think only the X1 is competitive (which appears to be only available at a $3.970 3-Year Partial Upfront RI Price per Hour..wow!)