SK0-005 Practice Test 27 — 15 Questions

Question 1

A server administrator is configuring RAID for a new file server that will store large media files. The server has six 4TB SAS drives and a hardware RAID controller with 1GB cache and battery backup. The administrator needs a RAID level that provides fault tolerance for up to two drive failures and maximizes usable capacity. Which of the following should the administrator choose?

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

Accepted Answer

RAID 6. RAID 6 is the correct choice because it provides double parity, allowing the array to continue operating after two drive failures. It also offers better usable capacity than RAID 10 with the same number of drives. RAID 5 only tolerates one failure, and RAID 0 offers no redundancy, so neither meets the requirement.

Answer

RAID 5

Answer

RAID 10

Answer

RAID 0

Question 2

A data center technician is installing a new 2U server that will host a virtualized environment. The server supports hot-swappable 2.5-inch NVMe drives in the front bays, but the operating system does not detect any drives after installation. The technician confirms the drives are properly seated and the backplane is connected to the motherboard. Which of the following is the MOST likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The backplane's NVMe ports are not connected to the motherboard's PCIe lanes or the correct HBA/RAID controller.. NVMe drives communicate over PCIe, and in a hot-swap backplane, the backplane must be cabled to PCIe lanes on the motherboard or a compatible controller. If those cables are missing or misconnected, the drives receive power but no data path, so they are invisible to the OS. Verifying the backplane cabling is the critical step before assuming drive or controller failure.

Answer

The NVMe drives require a U.2 to M.2 adapter to be recognized by the backplane.

Answer

The drives must be initialized in the RAID controller BIOS before they appear to the operating system.

Answer

The drives are not compatible with the backplane because they are SATA instead of NVMe.

Question 3

A technician is preparing to rack a new server and needs to confirm the cabinet can support its weight and power draw. The server's documentation lists a maximum of 750W and a fully loaded weight of 30 kg. Which of the following should the technician verify FIRST?

Accepted Answer

The cabinet's static and dynamic load ratings and the available PDU circuit capacity. Before racking a server, the technician must confirm the cabinet can support its weight, including during rail extension, and that the PDU and branch circuit can deliver the documented maximum draw. These structural and electrical checks are prerequisites. Bezel color, OS licensing, and noise or humidity ratings are secondary considerations that do not prevent physical or electrical failure.

Answer

The server's acoustic noise rating and the data center's ambient humidity

Answer

The operating system version the server will host and its licensing tier

Answer

The color of the server's front bezel and the rack's U numbering scheme

Question 4

A server administrator is investigating a production server that has been performing poorly for several days. Users report slow response times, and the administrator observes that CPU utilization stays near 100% even during off-peak hours. Task Manager shows the System process consuming most of the CPU. The administrator runs a performance counter capture and sees a sustained high rate of deferred procedure calls (DPCs). Which of the following is the MOST likely cause?

Accepted Answer

A failing storage controller driver generating excessive interrupts. Sustained high DPC time indicates a driver is spending excessive time in deferred procedure call routines, and the System process CPU usage reflects that kernel-level activity. Among the listed causes, only a failing storage controller driver would directly generate abnormal interrupt and DPC load. Memory leaks, thermal throttling, and DNS retries do not produce this specific performance counter pattern.

Answer

A memory leak in a user-mode application causing excessive paging

Answer

An overheating CPU throttling to a lower clock speed

Answer

A misconfigured DNS server causing repeated name resolution retries

Question 5

A datacenter administrator is reviewing physical security for a new server room. The company wants to ensure that only authorized personnel can access the racks and that any access attempts are logged. The room already has a locked door with a badge reader. Which of the following should the administrator implement to meet the requirements for rack-level security and auditing?

Accepted Answer

Install electronic rack locks with badge readers and audit logging.. Rack-level security requires controls that restrict and log access to each rack. Electronic rack locks with badge readers provide both physical prevention and an audit trail tied to individual racks. Room-level controls like biometrics, cameras, or mantraps do not satisfy the requirement for rack-level access control and logging.

Answer

Implement a mantrap at the entrance to the server room.

Answer

Install a biometric scanner on the server room door.

Answer

Place a security camera in the server room.

Question 6

A server administrator is troubleshooting a Windows Server 2019 machine whose system event log repeatedly shows unexpected shutdowns with no bugcheck code. The hardware is suspected of causing the reboots. Which of the following should the administrator check to identify a hardware-related cause? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Check the power supply units and review the chassis intrusion and fan status indicators.. Unexpected shutdowns with no bugcheck usually originate below the operating system, so the investigation belongs at the hardware layer. Out-of-band management logs capture thermal and power events the OS cannot record, while physical inspection of power supplies and cooling confirms the fault. Software-level tools and network firmware updates do not explain a reset that bypasses the OS.

Answer

Update the NIC firmware to the latest vendor release.

Answer

Examine the Windows Memory Diagnostic results for failing RAM modules.

Answer

Run sfc /scannow to repair corrupted Windows system files.

Question 7

A server administrator is tasked with installing a new PCIe expansion card into a rack-mounted server. The server will be used in a data center with limited airflow. Which of the following should the administrator consider to ensure proper installation and cooling? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Ensure the expansion card is compatible with the server's PCIe slot type and generation.. Proper installation of a PCIe card requires verifying compatibility with the slot and ensuring the server's air baffle is correctly installed to direct airflow. These two steps address both functional and thermal requirements. Other options like adjusting card fan speed, choosing a slot based on power supply proximity, or removing the top cover are not valid or safe practices for ensuring proper cooling.

Answer

Set the expansion card's fan speed to maximum using the server's management software.

Answer

Install the card in the slot closest to the power supply to reduce cable length.

Answer

Remove the server's top cover to improve airflow around the expansion card.

Question 8

A small business runs a Windows Server 2022 domain controller and a member file server. The administrator must ensure that if a server's system disk fails, the server can be rebuilt quickly with its operating system, roles, and settings intact. Backups are currently taken with Windows Server Backup to a dedicated backup volume on the same server. Which change should the administrator make?

Accepted Answer

Configure Windows Server Backup to store backups on a separate external disk or network share and schedule a bare-metal recovery backup including system state.. The core flaw is that the only backup copy shares a chassis with the data it protects. Moving backup storage to an external disk or network share and taking a bare-metal recovery backup with system state gives the administrator a copy that survives the server's failure and contains everything needed to rebuild it.

Answer

Enable Storage Replica between the system disk and the backup volume so the backup volume holds a live mirror of the operating system.

Answer

Convert the system disk to a RAID 1 mirror pair and continue storing backups on the existing backup volume.

Answer

Create a scheduled task that copies the Windows folder to the backup volume each night and enable shadow copies on the system volume.

Question 9

A datacenter administrator is hardening a new Windows Server 2022 host that will run a public-facing web application. The administrator needs to reduce the attack surface at the operating system level. Which two actions should the administrator take? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Enable the Windows Defender Firewall and create inbound rules that allow only the required web and management ports.. Reducing the operating system attack surface means removing what is not needed and restricting what remains. Disabling unused roles and services removes exploitable code, while enabling the host firewall and limiting inbound rules controls network exposure. Together they shrink the set of reachable services and reduce the likelihood of a successful compromise.

Answer

Grant all domain users local Administrator rights so that support staff can troubleshoot quickly.

Answer

Disable Windows Update on the server so that unexpected patches do not interrupt the web application.

Answer

Install a full desktop experience with all optional Windows features enabled to simplify future administration.

Question 10

A server administrator is investigating a performance problem on a Windows Server 2019 file server. Users report that large file copies to a data volume take far longer than expected, but small file operations are fine. The administrator opens Performance Monitor and observes that the PhysicalDisk\Avg. Disk sec/Write counter for the array hosting the data volume is consistently between 40 and 60 ms, while the same counter on the OS volume stays under 5 ms. Disk queue length on the data volume remains low. Which of the following is the MOST likely cause?

Accepted Answer

The write-back cache on the RAID controller has been disabled or the battery-backed cache unit has failed.. Elevated Avg. Disk sec/Write with a low queue length on a single array points to per-I/O latency rather than an overloaded queue. A failed battery-backed cache unit or disabled write-back cache forces the controller into write-through behavior, so each large write waits for physical media commit. This selectively penalizes large sequential writes while leaving small operations and the OS volume unaffected.

Answer

The data volume's partition is misaligned to the underlying RAID stripe.

Answer

The data volume is formatted with the ReFS file system instead of NTFS.

Answer

The server's NIC teaming configuration is using a standby adapter for the data path.

Question 11

A systems administrator is designing the backup strategy for a Windows Server 2022 file server that holds the company's only copy of active project data. The business requires that a single accidental deletion of a folder be recoverable quickly without a full restore, and that a ransomware event that encrypts the volume still leave a usable copy of the data. Which two actions should the administrator take to meet both requirements? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

Configure a backup job that writes to a target that is offline or immutable, such as rotated removable media or a hardened repository with immutability enabled.. The scenario pairs two distinct risks: a fast, granular recovery from an accidental deletion, and a clean copy surviving a ransomware event that compromises the live volume. Shadow copies handle the first by presenting browsable point-in-time versions on the same volume. An offline or immutable backup target handles the second, because the encrypted host cannot reach or alter that copy. RAID and encryption improve availability and confidentiality but provide no restoration path.

Answer

Increase the NTFS permissions on the project folder so only senior staff can delete files.

Answer

Configure RAID 6 on the data volume to protect the project data against loss.

Answer

Enable BitLocker with a TPM protector on the data volume to prevent unauthorized access to the backups.

Question 12

A server administrator is deploying a Linux server that must automatically start a custom application after every reboot. The application is a binary located at /opt/myapp/bin/myapp and requires the environment variable APP_HOME=/opt/myapp. The server uses systemd. Which of the following is the most appropriate way to ensure the application starts on boot and can be managed with systemctl?

Accepted Answer

Create a systemd unit file in /etc/systemd/system/myapp.service that includes ExecStart=/opt/myapp/bin/myapp and Environment=APP_HOME=/opt/myapp, then enable it with systemctl enable myapp.service.. The correct approach uses systemd, the standard init system on most modern Linux distributions. A unit file in /etc/systemd/system allows full lifecycle management via systemctl, and the Environment directive ensures the required variable is set. Enabling the unit ensures the application starts automatically at boot, meeting both the startup and management requirements.

Answer

Create a cron job with @reboot /opt/myapp/bin/myapp in the root crontab.

Answer

Place a shell script in /etc/profile.d/ that exports APP_HOME and starts the application.

Answer

Add a line to /etc/rc.local that exports APP_HOME=/opt/myapp and runs /opt/myapp/bin/myapp &.

Question 13

A server administrator is installing a PCIe expansion card into a 2U server and notices the card requires supplemental power but the server's power supply lacks a spare PCIe power connector. The server's documentation lists a maximum slot power budget of 75W for the x16 slot. Which of the following is the MOST appropriate action?

Accepted Answer

Verify the card's power requirement and confirm the PSU or riser can supply it before proceeding. Expansion cards with supplemental power connectors need more than the slot can deliver, so the technician must reconcile the card's actual power requirement with what the PSU and riser can provide. Confirming this before installation avoids underpowered operation, link instability, or damage. Relying on slot power, using unsafe adapters, or narrowing the lane width do not resolve the electrical shortfall.

Answer

Use a dual SATA-to-PCIe power adapter to feed the supplemental connector

Answer

Move the card to a x8 slot to reduce its power consumption

Answer

Install the card and rely on the slot to supply all required power

Question 14

A server administrator is troubleshooting a Linux server that is experiencing performance degradation. The administrator suspects high disk I/O. Which two commands should the administrator use to identify the processes and disks causing the I/O load? (Choose two.)

Accepted Answer

iotop -o. iostat -x 1 provides per-disk extended statistics, helping identify which disk is saturated. iotop -o shows per-process I/O usage, identifying which processes are causing the load. Together, they allow the administrator to correlate process activity with disk utilization. The other commands either focus on network, CPU/memory, or lack per-process or per-disk granularity.

Answer

top

Answer

vmstat 1

Answer

netstat -tuln

Question 15

A server administrator is troubleshooting a server whose time drifts several minutes per day, causing Kerberos authentication failures between the server and its domain controller. The server is a domain member with no special role. Which of the following is the MOST appropriate first step to correct the time synchronization problem?

Accepted Answer

Restart the Windows Time (W32Time) service and verify the domain time source.. A domain member should obtain time from the domain hierarchy, so the first corrective action is to ensure the Windows Time service is running and configured to use that source. Kerberos rejects authentication when clock skew exceeds its tolerance, which explains the reported failures. External NTP pools, policy changes, and CMOS replacement do not address the loss of domain synchronization.

Answer

Increase the Kerberos ticket lifetime policy on the domain controller.

Answer

Replace the server's CMOS battery and set the BIOS clock manually.

Answer

Configure the server to synchronize with an external NTP pool instead of the domain hierarchy.