Introduction to High-Performance Computing on Azure

Organizations across engineering, research, and data science are moving heavy computational workloads to the cloud to achieve unprecedented scale. If you need to run complex simulations, financial models, or large-scale data analysis, understanding how to leverage cloud-based high-performance computing (HPC) is an essential modern skill. This text-based course guides you from the fundamental concepts of supercomputing to deploying your first scalable HPC cluster on Azure. You will gain the practical knowledge required to select the right virtual machine families, configure high-speed networking, and manage resources efficiently without overspending. What you'll learn: * Understand the core components of cloud-based HPC, including compute nodes, storage systems, and specialized interconnects. * Configure specialized virtual machines optimized for compute-heavy and memory-intensive workloads. * Explore InfiniBand networking fundamentals to enable low-latency communication between cluster nodes. * Set up and manage cluster orchestrators and job schedulers to automate workload distribution. * Apply cost-management strategies and resource monitoring to optimize your cloud budgets. You will start by learning foundational HPC terminology and architecture before moving step-by-step through configuration scenarios, networking setups, and storage choices. Through detailed written explanations and structured exercises, you will learn how to design and maintain a reliable, high-performing environment. This course is designed for IT professionals, system administrators, and developers who are new to high-performance computing or cloud migration. No prior experience with HPC clusters is required, though a basic understanding of cloud concepts is helpful. Start reading today to unlock the power of cloud-scale supercomputing for your projects.