PAS-C01 Design of SAP Workloads on AWS Practice Question
An organization has a production SAP ERP system on AWS with a multi-node SAP HANA scale-out configuration. The system uses a cluster placement group for low latency. During a maintenance window, the administrator needs to stop and start all instances. After restart, the HANA nodes cannot communicate with each other. The cluster placement group is still intact, but the private IP addresses have changed. The HANA topology relies on hostnames resolved via /etc/hosts. What is the MOST likely cause and solution?
⚠ Common exam trap
Many exam-takers assume stopping and starting instances preserves all network configurations, but AWS explicitly changes private IPs by default unless Elastic IPs or static ENIs are used, which is a key nuance for SAP HANA multi-node setups.
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
✓
The private IP addresses changed, but /etc/hosts still has the old IPs. Update /etc/hosts with the new IPs or use Elastic IPs.
When EC2 instances in a cluster placement group are stopped and started, the private IP addresses can change unless they are configured with a primary Elastic Network Interface (ENI) or Elastic IP. Since the SAP HANA scale-out topology relies on hostnames resolved via /etc/hosts, the old IPs in that file become stale after the restart, breaking inter-node communication. Updating /etc/hosts with the new private IPs or assigning Elastic IPs to preserve the addresses resolves the issue.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
The private IP addresses changed, but /etc/hosts still has the old IPs. Update /etc/hosts with the new IPs or use Elastic IPs.
Why this is correct
Stop/start can change private IPs; using Elastic IPs or updating /etc/hosts resolves this.
- ✗
The EBS volumes were detached during stop. Reattach the volumes.
Why it's wrong here
EBS volumes remain attached across stop/start.
- ✗
The security group rules were reset. Reapply the security group rules.
Why it's wrong here
Security groups persist across stop/start.
- ✗
The cluster placement group was removed during stop/start. Recreate the placement group.
Why it's wrong here
Placement groups persist across stop/start if not explicitly deleted.
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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.