MLS-C01 Data Engineering Practice Question
A data engineering team needs to move 10 TB of historical data from an on-premises Hadoop cluster to Amazon S3. The data is currently stored in HDFS. Which service should they use for an efficient transfer?
⚠ Common exam trap
Candidates often mistakenly choose S3 Transfer Acceleration thinking it is for general data migration, but it only speeds up uploads to S3 and lacks HDFS integration and management features provided by AWS DataSync.
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
✓
AWS DataSync
AWS DataSync is the correct choice because it is designed to efficiently transfer large volumes of data from on-premises storage systems, including HDFS, to AWS services like Amazon S3. It uses a purpose-built network protocol and parallel multi-threading to optimize transfer speed over the internet or AWS Direct Connect, and it can handle the 10 TB volume without requiring physical appliances or complex streaming setups.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
AWS DataSync
Why this is correct
DataSync can transfer data from HDFS to S3.
- ✗
S3 Transfer Acceleration
Why it's wrong here
TA improves speed over internet but not optimized for HDFS.
- ✗
Amazon Kinesis Data Streams
Why it's wrong here
Kinesis is for real-time streaming, not batch transfer.
- ✗
AWS Snowball Edge
Why it's wrong here
Snowball is for offline transfer, not needed for 10 TB.
Quick reference
AWS S3 Storage Class Comparison
| Storage Class | Min Duration | Retrieval | Use Case |
|---|---|---|---|
| S3 Standard | None | Immediate | Frequently accessed data |
| S3 Standard-IA | 30 days | Immediate | Infrequent access, rapid retrieval |
| S3 One Zone-IA | 30 days | Immediate | Non-critical infrequent data |
| S3 Intelligent-Tiering | None | Immediate–hours | Unknown or changing access patterns |
| S3 Glacier Instant | 90 days | Milliseconds | Archive with instant retrieval |
| S3 Glacier Flexible | 90 days | Minutes–hours | Archive, flexible retrieval |
| S3 Glacier Deep Archive | 180 days | Hours | Long-term compliance archive |
Go deeper
Related to this question
About these practice questions
One of 1,672 original MLS-C01 practice questions on Courseiva, each with a full explanation and wrong-answer analysis — not exam dumps or protected exam content. Learn why practice questions differ from exam dumps →
JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This MLS-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 MLS-C01 exam.