AZ-305 Design data storage solutions Practice Test 8 — 15 Questions

Question 1

A company runs a large-scale write-intensive application that requires a horizontally scalable relational database. They need to distribute data across multiple nodes to handle high write throughput while supporting SQL queries, including joins and transactions. The solution must be fully managed and provide elastic scaling. Which Azure database service should they choose?

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

Accepted Answer

Azure Database for PostgreSQL Hyperscale (Citus). Azure Database for PostgreSQL Hyperscale (Citus) is the correct choice because it provides horizontal scaling (sharding) across multiple worker nodes using the Citus extension, which distributes data and parallelizes SQL queries. It supports full SQL, including joins and transactions, while offering elastic scaling for write-intensive workloads. This makes it ideal for large-scale relational databases that need high write throughput and horizontal scalability.

Answer

Azure SQL Database Hyperscale

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Azure Cosmos DB

Answer

Azure SQL Managed Instance

Question 2

A global e-commerce company runs a product catalog application that requires low-latency reads and writes from multiple geographic regions. The data is key-value structured and must be replicated with multi-region write capability. The company needs a fully managed NoSQL database service with guaranteed 99th percentile latency and automatic conflict resolution. Which Azure data service should they choose?

Accepted Answer

Azure Cosmos DB. Azure Cosmos DB is the correct choice because it is a fully managed NoSQL database that supports multi-region writes with automatic conflict resolution, guarantees 99th percentile latency, and provides low-latency reads and writes globally. Its multi-master replication and tunable consistency models meet the key-value structured data requirements and the need for high availability across geographic regions.

Answer

Azure Table Storage

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Azure Redis Cache

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Azure SQL Database

Question 3

A company stores unstructured data such as documents and images in Azure Blob Storage. The data is accessed frequently for the first month, then only rarely for the next year, and after that must be retained for 10 years for compliance. The company wants to minimize storage costs by automatically moving data to the most cost-effective storage tiers. Which Azure Blob Storage feature should they implement?

Accepted Answer

Lifecycle management policies. Lifecycle management policies in Azure Blob Storage allow you to automatically transition blobs to cooler tiers (e.g., from Hot to Cool, then to Archive) based on age or last modification time. This directly matches the requirement to move data from frequent access (first month) to rare access (next year) and then to long-term retention (10 years) while minimizing costs.

Answer

Azure Data Lake Storage access tiers

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Soft delete

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Immutability policies

Question 4

A company runs a high-performance computing (HPC) workload that requires low-latency access to large files (hundreds of GB) from thousands of Azure VMs concurrently. The files must be accessible via the NFS protocol and the solution must be a fully managed, POSIX-compliant file system that can scale throughput linearly with capacity. Which Azure storage solution should they choose?

Accepted Answer

Azure NetApp Files. Azure NetApp Files is the correct choice because it provides a fully managed, POSIX-compliant NFS file system that can scale throughput linearly with capacity. It is designed for HPC workloads requiring low-latency access to large files from thousands of concurrent VMs, offering sub-millisecond latency and high throughput that increases as you add capacity.

Answer

Azure Files (premium tier)

Answer

Azure Blob Storage with NFS 3.0 support

Answer

Azure HPC Cache

Question 5

A company needs to store audit logs for 7 years to meet compliance requirements. The logs are generated at a high volume and must be cost-effective. They need to run occasional queries on recent logs (less than 30 days old) but rarely on older ones. Which Azure storage solution should they recommend?

Accepted Answer

Azure Blob Storage with lifecycle management to Archive tier. Azure Blob Storage with lifecycle management to the Archive tier is the correct solution because it provides a cost-effective storage hierarchy for high-volume audit logs. Lifecycle management can automatically move logs from the Hot or Cool tier to the Archive tier after 30 days, aligning with the requirement to keep recent logs queryable while minimizing costs for older logs that are rarely accessed. The Archive tier offers the lowest storage cost, making it ideal for 7-year retention of audit data.

Answer

Azure SQL Database

Answer

Azure Cosmos DB

Answer

Azure Log Analytics

Question 6

A company needs to store and retrieve large binary files (e.g., images and videos) for a web application. The data must be accessible via HTTPS URLs and support both public read access for anonymous users and private access for administrators. The solution must be highly durable and cost-effective for storing terabytes of data. Which Azure storage solution should they recommend?

Accepted Answer

Azure Blob Storage. Azure Blob Storage is the correct choice because it is designed for storing large amounts of unstructured data, such as images and videos, and supports both public anonymous read access (via a public container or blob-level access policy) and private access (via shared access signatures or Microsoft Entra ID authentication). It provides HTTPS URL access for direct retrieval, offers 99.9999999999% (11 nines) durability for hot and cool tiers, and is cost-effective for terabytes of data due to its tiered storage options (hot, cool, archive).

Answer

Azure Files

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Azure Queue Storage

Answer

Azure Table Storage

Question 7

A global e-commerce company stores product catalog data in a JSON document format. The application requires low-latency reads and writes from multiple geographic regions. The solution must support multi-region writes with automatic conflict resolution and provide a guaranteed 99th percentile latency. Which Azure Cosmos DB API and consistency level should they choose?

Accepted Answer

SQL API with Session consistency. The SQL API with Session consistency is correct because it supports multi-region writes with automatic conflict resolution using last-writer-wins (LWW) and provides a guaranteed 99th percentile latency. Session consistency is the most widely used level for globally distributed applications, offering read-your-writes guarantees while maintaining low latency across regions.

Answer

Table API with Eventual consistency

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SQL API with Strong consistency

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MongoDB API with Bounded staleness consistency

Question 8

A company runs a data analytics application that stores large volumes of structured data in a relational format. The data is write-intensive and the application needs to scale horizontally for high throughput. The solution must support SQL queries, including joins and ACID transactions. Which Azure database service should they choose?

Accepted Answer

Azure Database for PostgreSQL - Hyperscale (Citus). Azure Database for PostgreSQL - Hyperscale (Citus) is correct because it provides horizontal scaling (sharding) across multiple nodes while preserving full SQL support, including JOINs and ACID transactions. Citus distributes data across worker nodes using a coordinator node, enabling write-intensive workloads to achieve high throughput through parallelized writes. This makes it ideal for large-volume, relational, write-heavy analytics applications that require relational integrity.

Answer

Azure SQL Database Hyperscale

Answer

Azure Cosmos DB (SQL API)

Answer

Azure Synapse Analytics

Question 9

A company runs a data analytics workload that processes large amounts of unstructured data (images and videos). The data is accessed frequently for the first month, then rarely. They need to store the data cost-effectively for 7 years to meet compliance. The solution must support fast retrieval of data within the first month. Which Azure storage solution should they recommend?

Accepted Answer

Azure Blob Storage with hot tier for 30 days, then lifecycle management to cool tier for 6 months, then archive tier. Azure Blob Storage with hot tier for the first 30 days meets the fast retrieval requirement for frequently accessed data, while lifecycle management automatically moves data to cool tier for 6 months and then to archive tier for the remaining 7-year compliance period, minimizing cost. The archive tier offers the lowest storage cost for rarely accessed data, and lifecycle policies ensure seamless transitions without manual intervention.

Answer

Azure Blob Storage with premium tier for 30 days, then lifecycle to archive tier

Answer

Azure Files with lifecycle management

Answer

Azure Disk Storage with snapshots

Question 10

A company needs to store sensor data from IoT devices. Each device sends a message every second. The data is time-series and will be queried for real-time dashboards and historical analysis. The solution must support high ingestion rates and low-latency queries on recent data. Which Azure service should they use?

Accepted Answer

Azure Event Hubs and Azure Data Explorer. Azure Event Hubs is designed for high-throughput data ingestion from millions of IoT devices, capable of handling millions of events per second. Azure Data Explorer (ADX) is optimized for time-series data, providing sub-second query latency on recent data and efficient historical analysis. Together, they form a serverless pipeline that ingests sensor data via Event Hubs and stores it in ADX for real-time dashboards and long-term analytics.

Answer

Azure Blob Storage with Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2

Answer

Azure Cosmos DB with SQL API

Answer

Azure Table Storage

Question 11

A company manages a fleet of millions of IoT devices that send telemetry data every minute. The data must be stored for 10 years to meet compliance requirements. For the first 30 days, data is accessed frequently for real-time dashboards and alerting. After 30 days, data is only accessed occasionally for historical analysis and reporting. The solution must be cost-effective and support high ingestion rates. Which Azure service should the company use to store and query this data?

Accepted Answer

Azure Data Explorer. Azure Data Explorer (ADX) is designed for high-ingestion, time-series telemetry data and supports real-time dashboards and alerting on fresh data, while also providing cost-effective long-term storage for historical queries. Its columnar storage and indexing enable fast analytics on billions of records, making it ideal for IoT scenarios with millions of devices sending data every minute and a 10-year retention requirement.

Answer

Azure Blob Storage with Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2

Answer

Azure SQL Database

Answer

Azure Cosmos DB with SQL API

Question 12

A global e-commerce company uses Azure Cosmos DB to store its product catalog. The catalog is read-heavy, with users worldwide expecting consistent reads with a 99th percentile latency under 10 ms. Writes to the catalog are performed by a central admin team in one region. The company needs to minimize write latency and cost while ensuring that users always see the same data within a single session. Which Cosmos DB configuration should the company choose?

Accepted Answer

Single-master write region with Session consistency and multiple read regions. Session consistency provides the required 'read your own writes' guarantee within a single session, which ensures users always see the same data during their session without the latency and cost penalties of Strong consistency. Single-master writes minimize write latency by directing all writes to one region (the central admin team's region), while multiple read regions allow global users to read from the nearest region with sub-10 ms latency. This configuration balances cost, performance, and consistency needs for a read-heavy catalog with centralized writes.

Answer

Single-master write region with Strong consistency and multiple read regions

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Multi-master write with Eventual consistency and all regions enabled for writes

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Multi-master write with Strong consistency and two regions

Question 13

A data platform must support analytical queries over petabytes of files in a data lake, while preserving hierarchical namespaces and fine-grained ACLs. Which storage service should you design around?

Accepted Answer

Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2.. Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 (ADLS Gen2) is the correct choice because it combines a hierarchical namespace with POSIX-like ACLs, enabling fine-grained access control at the file and directory level while supporting petabyte-scale analytical workloads. It is built on Azure Blob Storage, providing high-throughput and parallel processing for big data analytics engines like Azure Synapse, Spark, and Hadoop.

Answer

Azure Files premium shares.

Answer

Azure Table Storage.

Answer

Azure Queue Storage.

Question 14

A global company stores customer profile data in JSON format. The application requires low-latency writes and reads from multiple regions. The solution must support multi-region writes with automatic conflict resolution and provide high availability. Which Azure Cosmos DB configuration should they choose?

Accepted Answer

SQL API with eventual consistency and multi-region writes enabled. The scenario demands low-latency multi-region writes with automatic conflict resolution and high availability. Azure Cosmos DB's SQL API supports multi-region writes with eventual consistency, which is the only consistency level that allows multi-region writes. Eventual consistency provides the lowest latency and highest availability, and Cosmos DB's automatic conflict resolution handles concurrent writes across regions using last-writer-wins (LWW) or custom conflict resolution policies.

Answer

MongoDB API with strong consistency and multi-region writes enabled

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Table API with consistent prefix consistency and single-region writes

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Gremlin API with session consistency and multi-region writes enabled

Question 15

A company wants to store application configuration settings and secrets (e.g., database connection strings, API keys) securely with automatic rotation. Access must be controlled and audited. Which Azure service should they use?

Accepted Answer

Azure Key Vault. Azure Key Vault is the correct choice because it is designed specifically for securely storing and managing secrets, keys, and certificates. It supports automatic rotation of secrets via integration with Azure managed identities and event grid notifications, and provides fine-grained access control through Azure RBAC and access policies, with full auditing via Azure Monitor and diagnostic logs.

Answer

Azure App Configuration

Answer

Azure Storage Queues

Answer

Azure Service Bus