Amazon Redshift improves cluster resize performance and flexibility of cluster restore
Amazon Redshift has improved the performance of Redshift’s classic resize feature and increased the flexibility of the cluster snapshot restore operation. Redshift classic resize is used to resize a cluster in scenarios where you need to change the instance type or transition to a configuration that cannot be supported by elastic resize. Previously, this can take the cluster offline for many hours during resize, but now the cluster can typically be available to process queries in minutes. Clusters can also be resized when restoring from a snapshot and in those cases there could be restrictions.
Amazon Redshift has improved the performance of Redshift’s classic resize feature and increased the flexibility of the cluster snapshot restore operation. Redshift classic resize is used to resize a cluster in scenarios where you need to change the instance type or transition to a configuration that cannot be supported by elastic resize. Previously, this can take the cluster offline for many hours during resize, but now the cluster can typically be available to process queries in minutes. Clusters can also be resized when restoring from a snapshot and in those cases there could be restrictions.
Now you can also restore an encrypted cluster from an unencrypted snapshot or change the encryption key. Amazon Redshift uses AWS Key Management Service (AWS KMS) as an encryption option to provide an additional layer of data protection by securing customers’ data from unauthorized access to the underlying storage. Now you can encrypt an unencrypted cluster with an AWS KMS key faster by specifying an AWS KMS key ID when modifying a cluster. You can also restore an AWS KMS-encrypted cluster from an unencrypted snapshot. Access these features via API or CLI. Please note that the above features only apply to the target clusters with RA3 nodes.
These improvements are now available in most AWS Regions where Amazon Redshift is available. You can find more information from the Amazon Redshift Cluster Management guide and blog.