Differences between Azure Block Blob and Page Blob?

Question

As I recently started mingling around with Windows Azure, I've came up to a situation where, which one to go for between the Block Blob & Page Blob. I'm currently in progress of uploading some text, csv or dat files to a blob storage and then do a MapReduce program for it using my C# program. Yes I've gone through an article.

But couldn't get a clear idea from them. To cut short, Block Blob vs Page Blob. Any help would be appreciated.

Answer 1

The differences are very-well documented on msdn, here. TL;DR:

• Block blobs are for your discrete storage objects like jpg's, log files, etc. that you'd typically view as a file in your local OS. Max. size 200GB 4.77TB. Regular (non-Premium) storage only.
• Page blobs are for random read/write storage, such as VHD's (in fact, page blobs are what's used for Azure Virtual Machine disks). Max. size 8TB. Supported by both regular and Premium Storage.

Note: Premium page blobs have specific sizings (unlike regular page blobs, which can be any size up to 8TB).

• 32GB
• 64GB
• 128GB
• 512GB
• 1024GB
• 2048GB
• 4096GB

Premium storage provides guaranteed IOPS and throughput, depending on the page blob size chosen (from 120 IOPS+25MB/s @ 32GB to 7500 IOPS+250MB/s @ 2048GB & 4096GB). Specific details around IOPS+throughput details are documented here.

Answer 2

Davids answer points out the differences between page and block blobs. However there are also Append Blobs. In short:

• Block Blobs: For large objects that doesn't use random read and write operations. e. g. Pictures
• Page Blobs: Optimized for random read and write operations. e. g. VHD
• Append Blobs: Optimized for append operations. e. g. Logs

Further reading: Understanding block blobs, append blobs, and page blobs