DEA-C01 Data Store Management Practice Question
A company runs a production Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL database. The database is experiencing performance degradation due to a high number of concurrent read queries. The data engineer needs to improve read performance without significantly increasing costs. Which TWO actions should the engineer take? (Choose TWO.)
⚠ Common exam trap
Candidates often confuse Multi-AZ with read replicas, assuming the standby can serve reads, or they think increasing storage automatically improves IOPS and read performance without considering cost or the actual bottleneck.
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Create one or more read replicas in the same region.
Creating one or more read replicas in the same region offloads read traffic from the primary DB instance, directly addressing the high number of concurrent read queries. Read replicas are asynchronous copies that can serve SELECT traffic, improving read throughput without increasing the cost of the primary instance. This is a cost-effective scaling strategy because you pay only for the replica instances and can choose smaller instance sizes if read workloads are bursty.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Create one or more read replicas in the same region.
Why this is correct
Read replicas handle read traffic, reducing load on the primary.
- ✗
Enable Multi-AZ deployment for automatic failover.
Why it's wrong here
Multi-AZ improves availability, not read performance.
- ✗
Increase the allocated storage size to improve IOPS.
Why it's wrong here
Storage size increase may not directly improve read performance.
- ✓
Enable Performance Insights to identify slow queries.
Why this is correct
Performance Insights helps identify and optimize slow queries.
- ✗
Delete unnecessary indexes to reduce write overhead.
Why it's wrong here
Deleting indexes may reduce write overhead but can hurt read performance.
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Same concept, more angles
2 more ways this is tested on DEA-C01
These questions test the same concept from different angles. Work through them to make sure you can recognise it however the exam phrases it.
Variation 1. A company is running a production database on Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL. The database experiences high read traffic from multiple application servers. Which data store management strategy would reduce the load on the primary database instance?
easy- A.Enable DynamoDB Accelerator (DAX) for the database.
- B.Enable Multi-AZ deployment for automatic failover.
- ✓ C.Create an RDS Read Replica in the same region.
- D.Use Amazon ElastiCache to cache query results.
Why C: Creating an RDS Read Replica in the same region offloads read-heavy traffic from the primary PostgreSQL instance by providing a separate, read-only copy of the database. Application servers can direct SELECT queries to the Read Replica, reducing the primary instance's CPU and I/O load without affecting write performance. This is the most direct and cost-effective strategy for scaling read capacity in Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL.
Variation 2. A company runs a MySQL database on Amazon RDS. The database size is 500 GB and is experiencing high read traffic. The team wants to improve read performance with minimal operational overhead. Which action should they take?
easy- ✓ A.Create a read replica in the same region
- B.Enable Multi-AZ deployment
- C.Implement Amazon ElastiCache for caching
- D.Upgrade to a larger instance class
Why A: Creating a read replica in the same region offloads read traffic from the primary RDS instance by providing a separate, read-only copy of the database. This directly addresses high read traffic with minimal operational overhead, as RDS manages the asynchronous replication using MySQL's native binlog-based replication. The replica can serve SELECT queries, reducing load on the primary instance without requiring application changes.
JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This DEA-C01 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Amazon Web Services certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the DEA-C01 exam.