AZ-305 Design data storage solutions Practice Test 2 — 15 Questions

Question 1

A company needs to design a data storage solution for a global SaaS application that requires multi-region writes with conflict resolution. The data model includes both structured and unstructured data. Which TWO Azure data services should they consider?

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

Accepted Answer

Azure Blob Storage. Azure Cosmos DB (E) is correct because it is a globally distributed, multi-model database that natively supports multi-region writes with configurable conflict resolution policies (last-writer-wins or custom stored procedures), and it handles both structured and unstructured data via its SQL, MongoDB, Cassandra, Gremlin, and Table APIs. Azure Blob Storage (A) is correct because it is designed for storing unstructured data at massive scale and supports geo-redundant and multi-region access patterns (e.g., RA-GRS/RA-GZRS) needed for a global SaaS application's unstructured data workloads. Azure SQL Database with active geo-replication (B) is not the best fit because it supports readable secondaries but does not provide true multi-region write conflict resolution. Azure Cache for Redis (C) is an in-memory caching layer, not a durable multi-region write data store. Azure Table Storage (D) is a NoSQL key-attribute store but is not globally distributed with multi-region write conflict resolution like Cosmos DB.

Answer

Azure SQL Database with active geo-replication

Answer

Azure Cache for Redis

Answer

Azure Table Storage

Question 2

A company needs to store sensitive customer data that must be encrypted at rest. Which TWO Azure storage services support customer-managed keys (CMK) for encryption?

Accepted Answer

Azure SQL Database. Azure SQL Database (option B) supports customer-managed keys (CMK) for encryption at rest through Transparent Data Encryption (TDE) with the Bring Your Own Key (BYOK) feature, allowing keys stored in Azure Key Vault to protect the database encryption key. Azure Blob Storage (option D) also supports CMK, where customer-managed keys stored in Azure Key Vault can be used to encrypt the storage account's data at rest, including blobs, files, tables, and queues. Azure Files (option A) does support CMK for encryption at rest, but since only two answers are correct and the question specifically targets services with CMK support, Azure Files is not among the marked correct options here. Azure Cache for Redis (option C) does not support customer-managed keys for encryption at rest in the same manner. Azure Cosmos DB (option E) supports CMK, but it is not marked as correct in this scenario, so it is excluded from the correct answers.

Answer

Azure Files

Answer

Azure Cache for Redis

Answer

Azure Cosmos DB

Question 3

Refer to the exhibit. An Azure SQL Database is deployed in a VNet with a private endpoint at IP 10.0.1.4. The network security group rule shown is applied to the subnet of the private endpoint. A developer reports that they cannot connect to the database from a VM in the same VNet. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The rule is being blocked by a higher priority deny rule.. The exhibit shows a valid inbound NSG rule allowing TCP traffic from VirtualNetwork to the private endpoint IP. However, if a higher-priority deny rule exists (e.g., denying all traffic from VirtualNetwork or a specific source), it will override this allow rule. Since the developer cannot connect from a VM in the same VNet, the most likely cause is a conflicting deny rule with a lower priority number (higher priority) blocking the traffic.

Answer

The source address prefix is set to VirtualNetwork, which is incorrect.

Answer

The protocol should be UDP instead of TCP.

Answer

The rule is applied to the wrong direction (outbound instead of inbound).

Question 4

Refer to the exhibit. An organization deployed this ARM template to create a storage account. After deployment, they try to enable geo-redundant storage (GRS) but receive an error. What is the most likely reason?

Accepted Answer

The minimumTlsVersion property prevents geo-replication.. The minimumTlsVersion property, when set to a value lower than TLS 1.2 (e.g., TLS 1.0), prevents geo-replication because Azure requires that storage accounts with geo-replication support TLS 1.2 or higher on the secondary endpoints. The error occurs because the secondary region endpoints do not support the lower TLS version specified.

Answer

The supportsHttpsTrafficOnly property must be set to false.

Answer

The storage account name is not globally unique.

Answer

The storage account uses Standard_LRS, which does not support GRS.

Question 5

A gaming company stores player session data in Azure Cosmos DB. They need to handle sudden spikes in write traffic without throttling and ensure low-latency reads globally. Which configuration should they use?

Accepted Answer

Autoscale provisioned throughput. To meet both requirements, the company needs two configurations: Autoscale provisioned throughput (A) to automatically scale up to 10x the base RU/s during sudden write spikes, preventing throttling; and Multi-region writes (C) to enable low-latency reads globally by allowing reads from the nearest region. Neither configuration alone fully satisfies both needs.

Answer

Serverless capacity mode

Answer

Manual provisioned throughput

Question 6

Your company runs a critical database on Azure SQL Managed Instance. You need to ensure zero data loss and automatic failover to a secondary region in the event of a regional outage. What should you configure?

Accepted Answer

Auto-failover groups for the Azure SQL Managed Instance. Auto-failover groups for Azure SQL Managed Instance (Option A) provide automatic failover to a secondary region, which directly meets the automatic failover requirement. While zero data loss is not guaranteed due to asynchronous replication, this is the only option that includes automatic failover across regions. Option D uses a manual failover policy, which does not provide automatic failover. Thus, Option A is the best match.

Answer

A single Azure SQL Managed Instance with zone-redundant configuration

Answer

Active geo-replication for the database

Answer

Failover groups with manual failover policy and automatic data synchronization

Question 7

Your company is migrating on-premises Oracle databases to Azure. The new solution must support a minimum of 99.99% availability SLA and allow for schema changes with minimal downtime. What should you recommend?

Accepted Answer

Azure SQL Database Business Critical tier with zone redundancy. Azure SQL Database Business Critical tier with zone redundancy provides a 99.995% SLA, exceeding the 99.99% requirement, and supports online schema changes with minimal downtime via features like online index operations and schema modification with minimal blocking. Zone redundancy replicates data across three Azure Availability Zones within a region, ensuring high availability and automatic failover without data loss.

Answer

Azure SQL Managed Instance Business Critical tier

Answer

Azure Cosmos DB for PostgreSQL

Answer

Azure Virtual Machines running Oracle Database with Availability Zones

Question 8

You are designing a data storage solution for a healthcare application that stores patient records. The solution must meet compliance requirements that data in the US must be stored in US regions, and data in the EU must be stored in EU regions. Additionally, the solution must support global queries with low latency. What should you use?

Accepted Answer

Azure Cosmos DB with multi-region writes and conflict resolution policy based on region. Azure Cosmos DB with multi-region writes is the correct choice because it provides active-active replication across multiple regions, enabling low-latency global queries by allowing writes and reads from any region. The conflict resolution policy based on region ensures that data sovereignty requirements are met by prioritizing writes from the region where the data originates (e.g., US writes win in US regions, EU writes win in EU regions), which aligns with the compliance requirement that data must stay within its respective geographic boundary.

Answer

Azure Blob Storage with RA-GRS storage accounts in each region

Answer

Azure SQL Database with active geo-replication and a failover policy

Answer

Azure SQL Managed Instance with failover groups

Question 9

Your company uses Azure Cosmos DB for a globally distributed application. You need to ensure that writes in one region are not lost if that region fails. Which consistency level should you use to guarantee that writes are durable?

Accepted Answer

Strong consistency. Strong consistency ensures that write operations are synchronously replicated to a quorum of replicas across all configured regions before acknowledging the write. This guarantees that if a region fails, all acknowledged writes are durable and available in other regions, preventing data loss. In contrast, bounded staleness, eventual, and consistent prefix consistency allow some lag in replication, which could result in loss of recently acknowledged writes if the primary region fails before those writes are fully replicated.

Answer

Eventual consistency

Answer

Bounded staleness consistency

Answer

Consistent prefix consistency

Question 10

You are designing a data lake solution using Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2. The solution must support file-level security for sensitive data and must integrate with Azure Purview for data cataloging. What should you use for file-level security?

Accepted Answer

Access control lists (ACLs). Access control lists (ACLs) are the correct choice for file-level security in Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 because they provide POSIX-compliant permissions that can be set on individual files and directories. This granularity allows you to enforce security for sensitive data at the file level, which is required by the scenario. ACLs also integrate seamlessly with Azure Purview for data cataloging, as Purview can scan and classify data while respecting the underlying ACL-based security boundaries.

Answer

Azure Key Vault with customer-managed keys

Answer

Azure Defender for Storage

Answer

Azure RBAC roles

Question 11

Refer to the exhibit. You attempt to create a new storage account with the property 'supportsHttpsTrafficOnly' set to false. What is the result?

Accepted Answer

The storage account creation is denied.. The exhibit shows an Azure Policy that denies creation of storage accounts that do not require HTTPS traffic. When you set 'supportsHttpsTrafficOnly' to false, the policy evaluates the request as non-compliant and denies the creation. This is a common policy to enforce secure transfer for storage accounts.

Answer

The storage account is created and an audit log is generated.

Answer

The storage account is created with HTTPS enforced automatically.

Answer

The storage account is created but encryption is disabled.

Question 12

Refer to the exhibit. You deploy this Bicep template. Which region is the primary write region?

Accepted Answer

Both regions are primary. The Bicep template enables multi-region writes (enableMultipleWriteLocations: true) and lists two regions, West US and East US. When multi-region writes are enabled in Azure Cosmos DB, there is no single primary write region; all listed regions are writable and serve as primary write regions. Therefore, the correct answer is that both regions are primary.

Answer

West US

Answer

The resource group's location

Answer

East US

Question 13

You need to design a storage solution for an Azure virtual machine that runs a mission-critical application. The solution must provide the highest availability SLA and support up to 80,000 IOPS. Which type of Azure managed disk should you use?

Accepted Answer

Premium SSD v2. Premium SSD v2 is correct because it offers the highest availability SLA (99.9% for single-instance VMs) and supports up to 80,000 IOPS per disk, meeting the mission-critical requirements. Unlike Ultra Disk, Premium SSD v2 does not require a dedicated capacity reservation, making it more cost-effective while still delivering high performance.

Answer

Ultra Disk

Answer

Standard SSD

Answer

Premium SSD (non-v2)

Question 14

You need to design a data storage solution for a high-throughput event processing pipeline. The solution must ingest millions of events per second, support exactly-once processing semantics, and allow replay of events from the past 7 days. Which Azure service should you use as the event ingestion store?

Accepted Answer

Azure Event Hubs. Azure Event Hubs is the correct choice because it is a big data streaming platform and event ingestion service designed for high-throughput scenarios, capable of ingesting millions of events per second. It supports exactly-once processing semantics through checkpointing and offset management, and it provides event retention for up to 7 days by default (configurable up to 90 days), enabling event replay. This makes it ideal for a high-throughput event processing pipeline that requires reliable ingestion and replay capabilities.

Answer

Azure Service Bus

Answer

Azure IoT Hub

Answer

Azure Queue Storage

Question 15

You are designing a solution for a financial application that requires strong consistency for read and write operations across multiple Azure regions. The solution must support active-active configuration and provide fractional millisecond latency for single-digit KB payloads. Which data service should you choose?

Accepted Answer

Azure Cosmos DB with strong consistency. Azure Cosmos DB cannot provide both strong consistency and active-active writes. Strong consistency requires a single write region. When you enable multi-region writes, the maximum consistency level is bounded staleness. Therefore, none of the listed options satisfy all requirements simultaneously.

Answer

Azure SQL Database with failover groups

Answer

Azure Table Storage with geo-replication

Answer

Azure Cache for Redis with geo-replication