The cr1.8xlarge is a memory-optimized AWS EC2 instance: 32 vCPU and 244 GiB of memory, 7.63 GiB per vCPU. In the name, "1" is the generation and "8xlarge" is the size within the cr1 family. It runs on Intel Xeon E5-2670, and AWS introduced it in January 2013. cr1 is the current generation of the cr family, so there is no newer AWS size to migrate to. No single Spot node covers 32 vCPU and 244 GiB, so the equivalent is a fleet: 2 × mh.vs1.2xlarge, 32 vCPU and 256 GiB in total, $3.50/hr on AWS in US East (N. Virginia), from $0.042/hr on Rackspace Spot. Spot delivers compute as managed Kubernetes, so a node pool of that size is the native shape of the answer rather than a workaround — provided the workload scales horizontally.
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cr1.8xlarge gives you 32 vCPU and 244 GiB in a single machine. The largest comparable Spot node, mh.vs1.2xlarge, is 16 vCPU and 128 GiB, so the equivalent here is 2 nodes rather than one.
Spot runs as managed Kubernetes, so a 2-node pool is the normal way to run things rather than a workaround. If your workload already sits behind a load balancer, a queue or a scheduler, it spreads across them without changes. If it needs all 32 cores and 244 GiB in one process, it does not.
