PAS-C01 Operations and Maintenance Practice Question
An SAP system on AWS experiences intermittent performance degradation during peak hours. CloudWatch metrics show high CPU utilization on the application server but normal on the database server. The application server is an m5.2xlarge instance. Which action should the operations team take FIRST to diagnose the issue?
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
✓
Change the application server instance type to a compute-optimized instance like c5.4xlarge.
The application server is experiencing high CPU utilization; switching to a compute-optimized instance (like c5.4xlarge) helps determine if the performance issue is due to insufficient CPU resources. Option B is incorrect because the database server shows normal CPU, so increasing IOPS on its EBS volumes would not address the application server's CPU bottleneck. Option C is incorrect because the problem is not network-related; increasing network bandwidth would not alleviate CPU contention. Option D is incorrect because scaling out by adding more servers may help but is not the first diagnostic step; the first step should be to test a compute-optimized instance to isolate the CPU 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.
- ✓
Change the application server instance type to a compute-optimized instance like c5.4xlarge.
Why this is correct
Compute-optimized instances provide higher CPU performance.
- ✗
Increase the provisioned IOPS on the database server's EBS volumes.
Why it's wrong here
Database server shows normal CPU utilization; IOPS is not the issue.
- ✗
Increase the network bandwidth of the application server.
Why it's wrong here
Network bandwidth is not indicated as the bottleneck.
- ✗
Scale out the application tier by adding more application servers behind a load balancer.
Why it's wrong here
Scaling out may help but the first step should be to check instance type suitability.
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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.