PAS-C01 Technology Practice Question
An SAP HANA database running on an EC2 instance is configured with multiple EBS volumes using RAID 0 for increased throughput. During a backup operation, the instance experiences a significant drop in I/O performance. Which solution would best address this without affecting ongoing backups?
⚠ Common exam trap
A common mix-up: candidates think reducing volumes or switching to instance store will solve performance issues, but they overlook that RAID 0 performance scales linearly with the number of volumes, and instance store lacks durability for critical SAP HANA data.
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
✓
Add more EBS volumes to the RAID 0 array to increase total I/O bandwidth.
Adding more EBS volumes to the RAID 0 array increases the total number of I/O channels available, which directly improves aggregate throughput and reduces per-volume I/O pressure during backup operations. This is because RAID 0 stripes data across all volumes, so additional volumes distribute the I/O load more evenly, mitigating the performance drop without interrupting the ongoing backup.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✓
Add more EBS volumes to the RAID 0 array to increase total I/O bandwidth.
Why this is correct
More volumes in RAID 0 increase parallelism and throughput, helping during backup.
- ✗
Use instance store volumes for the HANA data instead of EBS.
Why it's wrong here
Instance store is temporary and data is lost on stop/termination.
- ✗
Use EBS snapshots for backup instead of file-level backup to reduce I/O load.
Why it's wrong here
Snapshots may still cause I/O latency during backup.
- ✗
Reduce the number of EBS volumes to limit the RAID 0 penalty.
Why it's wrong here
Reducing volumes reduces parallelism and performance.
Quick reference
RAID Level Comparison
| RAID Level | Min Disks | Fault Tolerance | Read | Write | Usable Capacity |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RAID 0 | 2 | None | Excellent | Excellent | 100% |
| RAID 1 | 2 | 1 disk | Good | Moderate | 50% |
| RAID 5 | 3 | 1 disk | Good | Moderate | 67–94% |
| RAID 6 | 4 | 2 disks | Good | Lower | 50–88% |
| RAID 10 | 4 | 1 disk per mirror | Excellent | Good | 50% |
RAID is not a backup strategy — it protects against disk failure but not against accidental deletion, ransomware, or site-level events.
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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.