350-601 Practice Test 1 — 30 Questions

Question 1

Refer to the exhibit. The interface fc1/1 is configured as an E_port. The connected switch also has an E_port configured. However, the interface shows an 'init' state. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The speed on the remote switch interface is set to 8000 Mbps.. The 'init' state on an E_port indicates that the link is up but the port is still initializing the Exchange Link Parameters (ELP) and Exchange Switch Capabilities (ESC) protocols. If the remote switch interface speed is set to 8000 Mbps (8 Gbps) while the local interface is configured for a different speed (e.g., 4 Gbps or 16 Gbps), the speed negotiation will fail, preventing the E_port from transitioning to the 'online' state. Cisco MDS switches require matching speed settings on both ends of an E_port for successful initialization.

Answer

The domain ID is not configured on either switch.

Answer

The port VSAN on the local interface is different from the remote.

Answer

The remote switch interface is not configured as a trunk.

Question 2

Refer to the exhibit. After applying this configuration, the engineer activates the zoneset with 'zoneset activate name ZONESET1 vsan 10'. The host with pwwn 10:00:00:00:c9:aa:bb:01 can communicate with the target with pwwn 10:00:00:00:c9:aa:bb:02. However, the host reports that it cannot see a third target with pwwn 10:00:00:00:c9:aa:bb:03. What is the most likely reason?

Accepted Answer

The third target is not a member of ZONE1.. The host can communicate with the target in ZONE1 (pwwn 10:00:00:00:c9:aa:bb:02) but not with the third target (pwwn 10:00:00:00:c9:aa:bb:03). This indicates that the zoneset activation was successful and the host is in the correct VSAN. The most likely reason is that the third target is not a member of ZONE1; in Fibre Channel zoning, only members of the same zone can communicate, and a device not in the zone will be invisible to other zone members.

Answer

The third target is in a different VSAN.

Answer

The zone name is case-sensitive and does not match.

Answer

The zoneset was not activated successfully.

Question 3

A network engineer is troubleshooting a slow backup performance between a backup server and a tape library connected via FC. The backup server is connected to a Cisco MDS switch at 8 Gbps, and the tape library is connected at 4 Gbps. The backup job is using hardware compression. Which factor is most likely limiting performance?

Accepted Answer

Port speed mismatch between the server and tape library. The backup server is connected at 8 Gbps while the tape library is connected at 4 Gbps. In Fibre Channel, the link speed is negotiated per port, and the end-to‑end flow is limited by the slowest link in the path. Even though the server can transmit at 8 Gbps, the tape library can only receive at 4 Gbps, creating a bottleneck that caps the backup throughput. Hardware compression on the tape library does not cause this speed mismatch; it actually reduces the amount of data written to tape, but the physical link rate remains the limiting factor.

Answer

Insufficient buffer credits on the MDS switch

Answer

Hardware compression on the tape library

Answer

Half-duplex mode on the FC link

Question 4

A data center engineer is deploying a new application on Cisco UCS Manager. The application requires consistent low-latency access to storage. The engineer decides to use SAN boot from a Fibre Channel SAN. Which configuration change is necessary on the UCS service profile to enable SAN boot?

Accepted Answer

Assign a persistent WWPN to the vHBA. To enable SAN boot from a Fibre Channel SAN, the UCS service profile must assign a persistent WWPN to the vHBA. The WWPN is used by the Fibre Channel fabric to identify the initiator and to zone the storage LUNs; a persistent WWPN ensures that after a server reboot or vHBA reconfiguration, the same WWPN is presented to the SAN, allowing the boot LUN to remain accessible. Without a persistent WWPN, the vHBA would use a dynamically generated WWPN, which would break the SAN zoning and boot path.

Answer

Enable VIF (Virtual Interface) on the vHBA

Answer

Configure a QoS policy for the vHBA

Answer

Set the vNIC to use dynamic MAC address

Question 5

Which TWO are valid methods to configure a Cisco UCS service profile for stateless computing? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Create a service profile from a template. Option A is correct because creating a service profile from a template is a core method for stateless computing in Cisco UCS. Stateless computing abstracts hardware identity (e.g., WWPNs, MAC addresses, UUIDs) from physical blades, allowing a service profile to be applied to any compatible blade without reconfiguration. Templates enable rapid, consistent deployment of these stateless profiles across multiple servers.

Answer

Use boot from SAN to store OS images

Answer

Assign persistent WWPNs to vHBAs

Answer

Configure local storage on the blade

Question 6

A data center engineer notices that a UCS B-Series blade server is failing to boot from a SAN LUN that is correctly mapped to the server's WWPN. The SAN switch shows that the LUN is accessible and the zone is configured correctly. The UCS Manager shows the server's vNIC is associated with a vHBA that has the correct WWPN, but the server's BIOS does not list the Fibre Channel boot target. Which configuration is most likely missing?

Accepted Answer

The boot policy is not defined or not attached to the service profile.. The boot policy defines the boot order and parameters (such as the SAN LUN target WWPN and LUN ID) for the server. If the boot policy is not defined or not attached to the service profile, the UCS Manager will not program the BIOS with the Fibre Channel boot target information, even though the SAN zoning and vHBA WWPN are correct. Without this policy, the server's BIOS has no instruction to attempt a SAN boot, resulting in the failure described.

Answer

The SAN connectivity policy is missing the Fibre Channel uplink pinning.

Answer

The vNIC/vHBA placement policy is incorrectly set to 'Express' mode.

Answer

A QoS policy is not applied to the vHBA.

Question 7

Refer to the exhibit. An administrator updates template-B but its associated profile SP2 shows 'unassigned'. The administrator wants SP2 to reflect the changes. What should be done first?

Accepted Answer

Associate SP2 with template-B using the 'bind' operation. In Cisco UCS Manager, a service profile (SP2) must be explicitly bound to a template (template-B) to inherit updates. The 'bind' operation associates the profile with the template, allowing changes made to the template to propagate to the profile. Simply disabling and re-enabling the template or waiting for automatic association does not establish this binding; the profile remains 'unassigned' until it is bound.

Answer

Disable and re-enable template-B

Answer

Wait for the automatic association to occur

Answer

Rebind all profiles to template-B

Question 8

Refer to the exhibit. An engineer applies this QoS policy to a Cisco Nexus 9000 switch in a data center. After applying the policy, storage traffic (iSCSI) is experiencing high latency and occasional drops. The engineer verifies that the iSCSI traffic is not matching the 'BulkData' class. What is the most likely cause of the issue?

Accepted Answer

The policy-map does not specify a priority queue for latency-sensitive traffic.. The correct answer is A because iSCSI is a latency-sensitive storage protocol that requires a strict priority queue to ensure low latency and minimal jitter. Without a priority queue configured in the policy-map, iSCSI traffic competes with other traffic classes on a best-effort basis, leading to high latency and drops even if it is not matching the 'BulkData' class.

Answer

The policy-map is applied at the system level, but iSCSI traffic is not classified under any class-map.

Answer

The bandwidth percent for class-default is too low, causing iSCSI to be starved.

Answer

The class-map 'BulkData' does not match the correct traffic because the match statement uses qos-group instead of dscp.

Question 9

A network engineer is troubleshooting a VXLAN EVPN problem where some endpoints are not reachable. The output of 'show bgp l2vpn evpn' shows Type-3 routes but no Type-2 routes for a specific VNI. What should the engineer check?

Accepted Answer

The VLAN corresponding to the VNI has no active ports.. Type-3 routes (IMET routes) are used for BUM traffic forwarding and are advertised when the VNI is configured under the NVE interface, even if no endpoints are active. Type-2 routes (MAC/IP advertisement routes) are only generated when the switch learns a MAC address on a VLAN associated with that VNI. If Type-3 routes exist but Type-2 routes are missing, the VNI is correctly configured for the overlay, but no active ports in the corresponding VLAN are learning MAC addresses, preventing Type-2 route generation.

Answer

The route-target import/export is misconfigured.

Answer

BGP session is not established.

Answer

The VNI is not configured under the NVE interface.

Question 10

A financial services firm has deployed Cisco UCS C-Series rack servers running VMware vSphere 7.0. They use Cisco Intersight for management. Recently, a critical application server (Server-A) became unresponsive. The Intersight dashboard shows the server's health status as 'Warning' with a firmware compliance alert: the server's Cisco Integrated Management Controller (CIMC) firmware version is 4.0(1a), while the Intersight firmware baseline is 4.2(1c). The server is running ESXi 7.0u2 on a local datastore. The storage is provided by a Cisco MDS switch via Fibre Channel. The server has two 10GbE uplinks to the fabric interconnect. The engineer notices that the vCenter Server cannot communicate with Server-A, and all VMs on that host are isolated. The engineer suspects the issue is related to the firmware mismatch. What is the most appropriate first step to resolve this issue while minimizing downtime?

Accepted Answer

Upgrade the CIMC firmware on Server-A from 4.0(1a) to 4.2(1c) using Intersight's firmware update capability.. The CIMC firmware mismatch (4.0(1a) vs. baseline 4.2(1c)) is a known cause of management-plane instability in Cisco UCS C-Series servers managed by Intersight. Upgrading the CIMC firmware to match the Intersight baseline using Intersight's built-in firmware update capability directly addresses the root cause, restoring proper communication between the server, Intersight, and vCenter, while minimizing downtime by avoiding disruptive OS-level changes.

Answer

Check vCenter logs to determine why communication failed.

Answer

Reinstall ESXi on Server-A to ensure a clean operating system.

Answer

Change the Intersight firmware baseline to match the current CIMC version (4.0(1a)).

Question 11

A large enterprise is using Cisco UCS Manager to manage a chassis with 8 B-Series blades. The environment uses a combination of Ethernet and Fibre Channel traffic. The UCS fabric interconnect (FI) is configured in end-host mode with two uplinks to the core network. Recently, the engineering team deployed a new service profile for a high-performance computing workload that requires 40Gbps Ethernet per vNIC and 16Gbps Fibre Channel per vHBA. The server has two vNICs and two vHBAs. After deployment, the server's OS shows only 10Gbps connectivity on each vNIC. The engineer checks UCS Manager and sees that the vNIC templates are set to '10 Gbps' and the vHBA templates are set to '16 Gbps' but the actual link speed for vNICs is only 10Gbps. The fabric interconnect ports are configured as 40Gbps uplinks. The engineer has verified that the server adapter supports 40Gbps. What is the most likely cause of the speed mismatch?

Accepted Answer

The vNIC template used in the service profile specifies a requested speed of '10 Gbps' instead of '40 Gbps'.. The vNIC template in the service profile defines the requested speed for the virtual NIC. If the template is set to '10 Gbps', the UCS Manager will allocate only 10 Gbps of bandwidth per vNIC, regardless of the physical adapter's capability or the uplink speed. Since the engineer verified the adapter supports 40 Gbps and the uplinks are 40 Gbps, the mismatch is directly caused by the template configuration.

Answer

The fabric interconnect uplinks are configured as 40Gbps, but the port channel is not configured correctly, causing speed negotiation to fail.

Answer

The server's adapter policy is set to 'Windows' mode, which limits Ethernet speeds to 10Gbps.

Answer

The QoS policy applied to the vNIC limits the bandwidth to 10Gbps.

Question 12

A storage network engineer is designing a Fibre Channel SAN with two Cisco MDS switches in a single VSAN. The design requires that if one switch fails, the storage traffic continues to flow without manual intervention. Which two technologies should be implemented?

Accepted Answer

Port channels. Fibre Channel multipathing (E) is correct because it enables multiple physical paths between initiators and targets, allowing storage traffic to continue automatically if one switch fails. This is typically implemented using multipathing software (e.g., EMC PowerPath, native OS MPIO) that load-balances and fails over across redundant SAN fabrics without manual intervention.

Answer

NPV

Answer

VSAN trunking

Answer

IVR

Question 13

A company is deploying FCoE in their data center. The design includes a Cisco Nexus 9000 switch with FEX modules. The storage team insists on using dedicated FCoE VLANs. Which best practice should be followed to ensure lossless behavior for FCoE traffic?

Accepted Answer

Enable PFC on the switch for the FCoE VLAN. Option D is correct because FCoE requires lossless transport to prevent frame drops that could corrupt Fibre Channel frames. Priority Flow Control (PFC), defined in IEEE 802.1Qbb, enables pause frames on a per-priority basis, allowing the FCoE VLAN to be configured with a dedicated priority class that receives no-drop treatment. On Cisco Nexus 9000 switches, this is achieved by enabling PFC on the specific VLAN used for FCoE traffic, ensuring lossless behavior without affecting other traffic classes.

Answer

Configure traffic shaping on FCoE interfaces

Answer

Use the same VLAN for FCoE and IP traffic to reduce VLAN count

Answer

Disable flow control on all interfaces

Question 14

Which THREE statements about Cisco UCS Manager automation using XML API are correct? (Choose three.)

Accepted Answer

Operations can be made idempotent by using the 'dn' (distinguished name) to specify the exact object.. Option A is correct because the Cisco UCS Manager XML API allows operations to be idempotent by using the 'dn' (distinguished name) attribute to target a specific managed object. When you include the 'dn' in an XML request, the operation applies only to that exact object, so repeating the same request produces the same result without side effects. This is a key design principle of the management information model (MIT) that ensures predictable and safe automation.

Answer

The API uses SNMP for configuration changes.

Answer

The UCS Manager XML API uses RESTful JSON format.

Question 15

A company has two Cisco MDS 9700 switches in a dual-fabric SAN. Each fabric has its own set of storage arrays and hosts. The company wants to enable selective communication between specific devices in Fabric A and Fabric B without merging the fabrics. Which Cisco technology should be used?

Accepted Answer

IVR. Cisco IVR (Inter-VSAN Routing) allows selective communication between devices in different VSANs without merging the fabrics. In this dual-fabric SAN scenario, IVR enables specific hosts in Fabric A to communicate with specific storage arrays in Fabric B while keeping the VSANs and fabrics logically isolated, preserving fault domains and administrative boundaries.

Answer

FCIP

Answer

NPV

Answer

Port channels

Question 16

An engineer is designing an automation solution for a large data center with multiple Cisco UCS Manager domains. Which approach best ensures idempotent configuration operations?

Accepted Answer

Using a declarative automation tool like Ansible with idempotent modules. Option B is correct because Ansible's declarative modules for Cisco UCS Manager (e.g., `ucs_*` modules) are designed to be idempotent: they compare the current state of the configuration against the desired state defined in the playbook and only apply changes when necessary. This ensures that running the same playbook multiple times yields the same result without unintended side effects, which is critical for large-scale automation across multiple UCS domains.

Answer

Writing imperative Python scripts that execute CLI commands

Answer

Directly calling UCS Manager XML API using POST requests

Answer

Using SNMP to set configuration parameters

Question 17

A storage administrator reports that an FC initiator cannot log in to the SAN. The FC switch shows the following on the interface connected to the initiator: 'VSAN 100, State: Offline'. Which action should be taken to resolve the issue?

Accepted Answer

Configure port speed manually on the switch interface. The interface state 'Offline' in VSAN 100 indicates a Layer 1 or Layer 2 issue, often caused by a speed mismatch between the FC initiator and the switch interface. Configuring the port speed manually on the switch interface forces the link to negotiate at a specific speed, resolving the mismatch and bringing the interface online. This is a common fix when auto-negotiation fails or the initiator does not support the default speed settings.

Answer

Create a zone including the initiator and target

Answer

Change the interface VSAN to match the initiator

Answer

Increase the number of buffer credits on the interface

Question 18

A Cisco MDS switch has the above configuration on two 16 Gbps FC interfaces. An engineer connects an initiator to fc1/2 and a target to fc1/1. The initiator cannot discover the target. What is the most likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The fc1/1 interface is configured as an E-port but is connected to a storage target.. Option D is correct because the configuration shows interface fc1/1 with the command 'switchport mode E', which explicitly configures it as an E-port (expansion port). E-ports are used to interconnect two Fibre Channel switches, not to connect a storage target. When a target is connected to an E-port, the link will not come up properly because the target expects to be connected to an F-port (fabric port) or FL-port, preventing discovery by the initiator.

Answer

The fc1/2 interface is configured as an F-port but the initiator requires an FL-port.

Answer

The fc1/1 interface is configured as dedicated rate-mode but the target expects shared.

Answer

The fc1/2 interface is configured as shared rate-mode which prevents F-port operation.

Question 19

Refer to the exhibit. An automation script queries the Cisco Nexus 9000 using the NX-API JSON format and receives the above output. The script is designed to validate that interface Eth1/1 is in access mode with VLAN 100. However, the script reports a failure. What is the most likely reason?

Accepted Answer

The script uses strict type checking, and the values are returned as strings instead of integers.. The NX-API returns all values as strings in JSON output, including numeric fields like VLAN IDs. If the script uses strict type checking (e.g., `===` in Python or JavaScript), comparing the string '100' to the integer 100 will fail, even though the interface is correctly configured in access mode with VLAN 100. This is a common pitfall when parsing NX-API responses without explicit type conversion.

Answer

The JSON output is malformed and cannot be parsed.

Answer

The interface is administratively down.

Answer

The JSON output is missing the 'switchportMode' field.

Question 20

A data center engineer is designing a storage network for a virtualized environment with 100 hosts and 50 storage arrays. Each host requires 4 Gbps of bandwidth to storage, and each storage array provides 8 Gbps. All devices use 16 Gbps FC links. What is the minimum number of 16 Gbps FC links required to support the total bandwidth demand without oversubscription?

Accepted Answer

25. The total bandwidth demand from hosts is 100 hosts × 4 Gbps = 400 Gbps. Each storage array provides 8 Gbps, so total storage bandwidth is 50 arrays × 8 Gbps = 400 Gbps. Since all links are 16 Gbps FC, the minimum number of links required to carry 400 Gbps without oversubscription is 400 / 16 = 25 links. This assumes full-duplex links and no oversubscription in the fabric.

Answer

50

Answer

200

Answer

100

350-601 Practice Test 1 — 30 Questions

Exhibit

350-601 Practice Test 1 — 30 Questions

Exhibit