ANS-C01 Network Management and Operations Practice Question
A company is using AWS Direct Connect to connect its on-premises data center to AWS. The network team wants to monitor the latency and packet loss on the Direct Connect virtual interfaces. Which AWS service should be used to measure these metrics?
⚠ Common exam trap
Test-takers frequently confuse AWS CloudWatch with AWS X-Ray, assuming X-Ray can measure network latency because it traces HTTP requests, but X-Ray operates at the application layer and cannot measure Layer 2 or Layer 3 packet loss or latency on a Direct Connect virtual interface.
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 CloudWatch
AWS CloudWatch is the correct service because it provides built-in metrics for Direct Connect virtual interfaces, including 'VirtualInterfaceRxNoPacket' and 'VirtualInterfaceTxNoPacket' for packet loss, and you can derive latency by monitoring the 'VirtualInterfaceBpsEgress' and 'VirtualInterfaceBpsIngress' metrics with appropriate alarms. CloudWatch also supports custom metrics and logs that can be used to calculate round-trip time (RTT) by analyzing ping results or using AWS Direct Connect's native health checks. This allows the network team to set up dashboards and alarms for latency and packet loss directly from the Direct Connect metrics.
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 Config
Why it's wrong here
Config tracks resource changes, not performance.
- ✓
AWS CloudWatch
Why this is correct
CloudWatch metrics for Direct Connect include latency and packet loss.
- ✗
AWS X-Ray
Why it's wrong here
X-Ray is for application tracing.
- ✗
AWS CloudTrail
Why it's wrong here
CloudTrail logs API calls, not network performance.
Go deeper
Related to this question
About these practice questions
One of 1,621 original ANS-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 ANS-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 ANS-C01 exam.