PAS-C01 Design of SAP Workloads on AWS Practice Question
A company is running SAP ERP on AWS and is experiencing high costs due to underutilized EC2 instances. The SAP system is non-production and can tolerate interruptions. Which approach would most cost-effectively reduce costs without compromising the ability to resume operations quickly?
⚠ Common exam trap
Test-takers frequently assume Reserved Instances are always the best cost-saving option, but the question explicitly states the workload is non-production and can tolerate interruptions, making Spot Instances the most cost-effective choice despite their potential for interruption.
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
✓
Use EC2 Spot Instances for the application servers and configure them to be terminated gracefully
EC2 Spot Instances offer significant cost savings (up to 90% compared to On-Demand) for fault-tolerant, non-production SAP workloads. By configuring graceful termination (e.g., using lifecycle hooks or AWS Systems Manager to drain SAP application server connections before the instance is interrupted), the system can resume quickly when capacity becomes available again, meeting the requirement for cost reduction without compromising rapid recovery.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
Purchase Reserved Instances for the current usage to get a discount
Why it's wrong here
Reserved Instances require a 1- or 3-year commitment and may not be cost-effective if usage changes.
- ✗
Increase the instance size to improve performance and reduce runtime
Why it's wrong here
Larger instances cost more, not less.
- ✓
Use EC2 Spot Instances for the application servers and configure them to be terminated gracefully
Why this is correct
Spot Instances offer significant cost savings and can be interrupted, which is acceptable for non-production systems.
- ✗
Use Dedicated Hosts to reduce licensing costs
Why it's wrong here
Dedicated Hosts are generally more expensive and not needed for non-production.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This PAS-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 PAS-C01 exam.