AZ-104 Deploy and Manage Azure Compute Practice Test 12 — 15 Questions

Question 1

A development VM is recreated from scratch every week. The team wants the operating system disk to boot as quickly as possible and does not need the OS disk contents to survive deallocation. Which disk choice should the administrator make?

Choose an answer to begin — your selection is scored in the full session.

Accepted Answer

An ephemeral OS disk. An ephemeral OS disk is created on the local VM host storage, not on Azure managed storage, which eliminates network latency and provides significantly faster boot times. Since the team does not need the OS disk contents to survive deallocation and recreates the VM weekly, ephemeral disks are ideal as they are reset to the original image state on each deployment.

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A Premium SSD managed OS disk

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A Standard SSD managed OS disk

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The VM temporary disk as the operating system disk

Question 2

Based on the exhibit, a Windows VM must install IIS and run a configuration script automatically right after deployment. The administrator does not want to sign in to the VM manually. Which Azure feature should be used?

Accepted Answer

Virtual machine extension, such as the Custom Script Extension.. The Custom Script Extension (CSE) is the correct Azure feature because it allows you to run PowerShell or Bash scripts on a VM after deployment without manual sign-in. By specifying the script in the VM's deployment template or via Azure CLI/Portal, IIS can be installed and the configuration script executed automatically during provisioning. This aligns with the requirement for zero-touch post-deployment automation.

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Azure Policy with a modify effect.

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An availability set.

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A private endpoint.

Question 3

Based on the exhibit, the team wants a readable, repeatable deployment definition stored in source control. Which approach should they use for the Azure resources?

Accepted Answer

Bicep because it provides a concise declarative syntax for Azure deployments.. Bicep is a domain-specific language (DSL) that provides a concise, declarative syntax for deploying Azure resources. It is designed to be more readable than ARM templates and can be stored in source control, enabling repeatable, version-controlled deployments. This directly meets the team's requirement for a readable, repeatable deployment definition.

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Azure Policy because it enforces the deployment automatically.

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A runbook in Azure Automation because it is always easier to read than templates.

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A resource lock because it prevents unauthorized changes to the deployment.

Question 4

A stateless web application needs a group of identical Azure VMs that can automatically add more instances during the workday and remove them at night based on CPU usage. What should the administrator deploy?

Accepted Answer

A virtual machine scale set with autoscale rules. A virtual machine scale set (VMSS) with autoscale rules is the correct solution because it provides a group of identical, load-balanced VMs that can automatically scale out (add instances) during high CPU usage in the workday and scale in (remove instances) at night based on CPU thresholds. This matches the stateless, elastic requirement perfectly, as VMSS is designed for horizontal scaling of identical instances with autoscale policies tied to metrics like CPU percentage.

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An availability set with two VMs

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A single VM with a larger disk

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An Azure Policy assignment to increase CPU capacity

Question 5

A stateless web tier must survive a datacenter outage in a region that supports availability zones, and the number of instances should increase during business hours. Which three actions should the administrator take? Select three.

Accepted Answer

Deploy the workload as a virtual machine scale set instead of a standalone VM.. A virtual machine scale set (VMSS) provides automatic scaling and high availability across multiple instances, which is essential for a stateless web tier that must survive a datacenter outage. By deploying as a scale set instead of a standalone VM, the administrator gains the ability to distribute instances across availability zones and configure autoscale rules to adjust capacity based on demand, meeting both the resilience and elasticity requirements.

Answer

Place all instances in a single availability set and scale them manually.

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Deploy only one zonal VM and use snapshots to recover if the datacenter fails.

Question 6

A stateless API must run 4 to 12 identical Windows VMs, scale out automatically when average CPU stays above 70% for 10 minutes, and distribute instances to improve resiliency. Deployments are defined in Bicep. Which Azure compute service should be used?

Accepted Answer

A virtual machine scale set with autoscale enabled. A virtual machine scale set (VMSS) with autoscale enabled is the correct choice because it supports running multiple identical Windows VMs, can automatically scale out when average CPU exceeds 70% for 10 minutes, and distributes instances across fault domains and availability zones for resiliency. Bicep deployments natively define VMSS configurations, making it the ideal compute service for stateless, scalable API workloads.

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A single Azure VM with an autoscale setting

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An availability set with manual VM resizing

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Azure Container Instances running one container per request

Question 7

A stateless web application must automatically add VM instances during business hours and remove them at night based on CPU usage. Which Azure service should be deployed?

Accepted Answer

Virtual machine scale set. Virtual Machine Scale Sets (VMSS) are designed to automatically scale the number of VM instances in or out based on metrics like CPU usage, and they support scheduled scaling to align with business hours. This makes them the correct choice for a stateless web application that needs to add instances during business hours and remove them at night, as VMSS can integrate with Azure Autoscale to adjust capacity based on both performance metrics and time schedules.

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Availability set

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Azure Bastion

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Proximity placement group

Question 8

Two application VMs run in the same Azure region. The business wants to reduce the chance that both VMs are rebooted during planned host maintenance, but a datacenter outage is not part of the requirement. What should the administrator configure?

Accepted Answer

Availability set. An availability set ensures that VMs are placed on different fault domains and update domains within the same Azure datacenter. This configuration guarantees that during planned host maintenance, only one update domain is rebooted at a time, reducing the chance that both VMs are rebooted simultaneously. Since the requirement explicitly excludes a datacenter outage, an availability set is the correct choice to protect against planned maintenance events.

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Availability zone

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Azure Load Balancer

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Virtual machine scale set

Question 9

A release team needs to deploy the same hardened Windows image to VMs in three regions. They must keep approved versions, replicate images to each region, and be able to roll back to an earlier approved version without uploading a new VHD. What should they use as the image source?

Accepted Answer

An Azure Compute Gallery image definition with image versions. Azure Compute Gallery (formerly Shared Image Gallery) allows you to store multiple versions of a custom image definition, replicate them across regions, and manage rollbacks by simply changing which image version is referenced during deployment. This meets all requirements: hardened Windows image, multi-region replication, version control, and rollback without uploading a new VHD.

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A managed disk snapshot captured from one reference VM

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A single unmanaged VHD stored in a storage account

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A custom script extension that installs the operating system settings after deployment

Question 10

A platform team must deploy the same group of Azure VMs every month from source control and wants the deployment to be repeatable and reviewable. Which approach should they use?

Accepted Answer

A Bicep template in source control. Bicep is a domain-specific language (DSL) for deploying Azure resources declaratively. Storing a Bicep template in source control ensures the VM deployment is repeatable (same parameters produce identical infrastructure) and reviewable (changes are tracked via pull requests and commit history), meeting the team's requirements for infrastructure as code (IaC).

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Manual portal deployment each month

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A temporary virtual machine snapshot

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A network security group rule collection

Question 11

Based on the exhibit, the workload must keep running if an entire datacenter in the region becomes unavailable. The region supports availability zones. What should you deploy?

Accepted Answer

Availability zones with the VMs distributed across zones.. Availability zones are physically separate datacenters within an Azure region, each with independent power, cooling, and networking. Deploying VMs across multiple zones ensures that if one entire datacenter fails, the workload continues running in the other zone(s), meeting the requirement for regional datacenter-level resilience.

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An availability set with one update domain per VM.

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A single VM with a premium SSD data disk.

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An Azure proximity placement group.

Question 12

A line-of-business web tier consists of two Azure VMs in a region that supports availability zones. The business requirement is to survive a full datacenter outage in that region without deploying to a second region. What should the administrator use?

Accepted Answer

Availability zones with the VMs placed in different zones. Availability zones are physically separate datacenters within an Azure region, each with independent power, cooling, and networking. Placing the two VMs in different zones ensures that if one entire datacenter fails, the other VM remains operational, meeting the requirement to survive a full datacenter outage without deploying to a second region.

Answer

An availability set with multiple update domains

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A proximity placement group for both VMs

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A single-zone virtual machine scale set

Question 13

After a Windows VM is deployed, an administrator must install IIS, copy application files, and run a post-deployment configuration script without connecting interactively to the server. Which Azure feature should be used?

Accepted Answer

Custom Script Extension.. The Custom Script Extension (CSE) is the correct Azure feature because it allows you to run scripts on an Azure VM after deployment without requiring interactive login. It is specifically designed for post-deployment configuration tasks like installing IIS, copying application files, and executing configuration scripts, all executed via the Azure VM agent.

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An availability zone assignment.

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A route table association.

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A user-assigned managed identity alone.

Question 14

A development team needs a new Windows VM created from an approved hardened image, and IIS must be installed automatically after deployment. Which three actions should the administrator take? Select three.

Accepted Answer

Use an Azure Compute Gallery image version created from the approved hardened build.. An Azure Compute Gallery (formerly Shared Image Gallery) allows you to create and store custom VM images, including hardened builds. Using a gallery image version ensures the VM is deployed from an approved, pre-configured image that meets security and compliance requirements, avoiding the need to manually harden a fresh marketplace image.

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Start from a fresh marketplace image and harden it manually after the VM is running.

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Install IIS interactively after logging in to the VM with an administrator account.

Question 15

Two line-of-business VMs in a single region must stay available if one physical host is patched or fails. A zone failure is not part of the requirement. Which three actions should the administrator take? Select three.

Accepted Answer

Create an availability set for the application VMs before deployment.. An availability set ensures that VMs are placed on different fault domains (physical hosts) and update domains within a single Azure region, protecting against physical host patching or failure. This meets the requirement of keeping VMs available during a single host event without requiring zone-level redundancy.

Answer

Deploy the VMs in separate availability zones to protect against a datacenter outage.

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Use a single larger VM and rely on snapshots for uptime.