Are you in need of a SharePoint Server 2013 dev/test or proof-of-concept environment? Check out these four options:

• Basic configuration for an Internet-facing farm (3 servers)
• High-availability configuration for an Internet-facing farm (9 servers)
• SharePoint 3-tier configuration emulating an intranet farm (5 servers)
• SharePoint intranet farm in a hybrid cloud (6 servers)

Basic configuration for an Internet-facing farm

Here is the basic, Internet-facing farm.

 

Use this configuration as an Internet-facing test farm using a cloud-only Azure virtual network. This farm is not connected back to your organization network through a site-to-site VPN connection.

You can deploy this in two ways:

• For an Azure Resource Manager deployment, use the Create a Three VM SharePoint Deployment Resource Manager template.
• For an Azure Service Management deployment, use SharePoint Server Farm in the Azure Preview Portal.

In both cases, you specify very few configuration settings and let the template or the Preview Portal perform the computer and farm configuration for you.

For information about the new Azure Resource Manager, see Azure Compute, Network & Storage Providers under Azure Resource Manager

High-availability configuration for an Internet-facing farm

Here is the high-availability, Internet-facing farm.

 

Like the basic configuration above, this configuration is for an Internet-facing test farm with a cloud-only Azure virtual network. This farm is not connected back to your organization network through a site-to-site VPN connection.

• For an Azure Resource Manager deployment, use the Create an new HA SharePoint Farm Resource Manager template.
• For an Azure Service Management deployment, use SharePoint Server Farm in the Azure Preview Portal.

These methods can save you a lot of configuration time, but you will need an Azure subscription that supports 9 servers and 19 cores.

SharePoint 3-tier configuration emulating an intranet farm

With the SharePoint 3-tier farm in Azure Test Lab Guide (TLG), you build a simple 3-tier farm, complete with a client computer. This is an Azure-based alternative to building a SharePoint test lab with on-premises computers or virtual machines.

 

Use this configuration as an intranet test farm using a cloud-only Azure virtual network. It emulates an intranet farm relative to the CLIENT1 computer, rather than from your organization intranet. Unlike the SharePoint Server Farm configurations previously described, there is no Internet access to the resources of the SharePoint farm.

The advantage to this configuration is that you can use a set of existing SharePoint TLGs to configure permissions, authentication, profile synchronization, and social networking. For more information, see SharePoint Server 2013 Test Lab in Azure.

SharePoint intranet farm in a hybrid cloud

With SharePoint intranet farm in a hybrid cloud, you build a simple two-tier farm, complete with a simplified on-premises organization network containing a domain controller and client computer.

Use this configuration as an intranet test farm using a cross-premises Azure virtual network. It emulates an intranet farm relative to the CLIENT1 computer on your simplified on-premises network. There is no Internet access to the SharePoint farm.

The advantage to this configuration is the inclusion of a site-to-site VPN connection and the ability to experience the performance and administration of an emulated intranet SharePoint farm relative to your location on the Internet.

Note that you can also build this using the simulated hybrid cloud. Here is the result.

 

If you can think of other SharePoint Server 2013 dev/test configurations that you would like to see, comment on this blog post or in the Disqus comments of the articles linked above.

Thanks.