Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud
User Guide (API Version 2012-04-01)
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Error Messages FAQ

Why do I get an "InsufficientInstanceCapacity" error when I try to launch an instance?

This error indicates that we do not currently have enough available capacity to service your request.

If you are requesting a large number of instances, there might not be enough server capacity to host them. You can try again later or specify a smaller number of instances.

Why do I get an "InstanceLimitExceeded" error when I try to launch an instance?

This error indicates you reached your concurrent running instance limit. For new AWS accounts, the limit is 20.

If you need additional capacity, please complete the form at http://aws.amazon.com/contact-us/ec2-request.

Why can't I retrieve my instance-specific data from within a running instance when querying http://169.254.169.254/latest/?

The Parameterized Launches feature is available to instances that were launched after the feature was released. If you launched your instance before this, the data will not be available. If you want to use this functionality, relaunch your instances.

If you still experience problems retrieving the data after relaunching your instance, check the following:

  • Verify you are using the correct base URI (http://169.254.169.254/latest/)

  • Verify you are using the correct URI for the data you are trying to retrieve. Depending on the data, a trailing '/' might be required

  • Verify you specified launch data when launching your instances. If not, you will get a HTTP error response (404) when trying to retrieve the user data

    [Note]Note

    Instance metadata is always available, even if you do not specify it at instance launch.

Why do I get keep getting "Request has expired" errors?

To reduce the risk of replay attacks, our requests include a timestamp. This and the most important parts of the request are signed to ensure the message (including the timestamp) cannot be modified without detection.

If the difference between the timestamp in the request and the time on our servers is larger than 5 minutes, the request is too old (or too new) and an error is returned.

You need to ensure that your system clock is accurate and configured to use the correct time zone. For more information, go to NTP.

My instance is in a "running" state but shows 272 for its state code. What does that mean?

This typically indicates some sort of issue with the host running the instance. First try rebooting the instance (through the AWS Management Console, or with ec2-reboot-instances or RebootInstances). Caution: for Windows instances, this operation performs a hard reboot that might result in data corruption.

If the reboot doesn't work, post a message to the EC2 forums with the instance ID. Typically someone from the EC2 team can get your instance back to a normal state. You can search for "code 272" in the forums and find previous messages others have posted.