Getting started with Stock images on VPC

Images on VPC - Stock images

When you provision a virtual server on your VPC, you need to select an image to determine the operating system for the server. The following groups of operating system stock images are available:

• x86 virtual server images
• Deprecated s390x virtual server images
• Bare metal server images

All available stock images can be found in the IBM Cloud console. Go to the Navigation menu > Infrastructure > Compute > Images > Stock images. You can also programmatically list images by calling the /images method in the VPC API, or running the is images command from the IBMCLOUD CLI.

When you use an IBM stock image, you must apply the most recent security patches and any updates that are provided by the operating system vendor. After you provision a virtual server, it is your responsibility to continue to regularly make package updates for the operating system. If you are using the RHEL AI 1.x stock image, you can't apply updates to an existing virtual server instance. You must provision a new virtual server instance with the most recent image.

When you provision a boot volume, its capacity must match or exceed the size of the stock image. Most stock images require a 100 GB boot volume. Some Linux stock images can be installed on a boot volume with capacity of as little as 10 GB, while some Windows stock images require a minimum of 40 GB.

To create a virtual server with a stock image, see one of the following topics:

• Creating a virtual server instance in the console
• Creating a virtual server instance from the CLI - provision with a stock or custom image
• Creating a virtual server instance with the API - provision with a stock or custom image
• Creating an instance with Terraform