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Question 410 of 1,733

Operations and Maintenance →hardMultiple ChoiceObjective-mapped

SAP HANA Performance Degradation Due to Full Log Volume

This PAS-C01 practice question tests your understanding of operations and maintenance. The scenario asks you to isolate a root cause — eliminate options that address a different problem before choosing. After answering, compare your reasoning against the explanation and wrong-answer breakdown below. Once you have made your selection, read the full explanation to reinforce the concept and understand why each distractor is designed to mislead on exam day.

A company runs a critical SAP ERP system on AWS. The architecture includes an SAP HANA database on an r5.24xlarge instance (with 768 GB RAM) in us-east-1a, and multiple SAP application servers in an Auto Scaling group across two Availability Zones (us-east-1a and us-east-1b). The database uses EBS volumes: two 1 TB gp3 volumes for data, one 500 GB gp3 for log, and one 100 GB gp3 for backup. The system has been running without issues for months. At 3:00 PM, the operations team receives alerts from Amazon CloudWatch that the HANA database instance's CPU utilization is at 100%, memory usage is at 95%, and the disk queue length for the log volume is consistently above 10. The SAP application is experiencing intermittent timeouts. The team checks the HANA studio and sees that there are many long-running queries and that the log volume is almost full (95% used). The database backups are scheduled to run at 2:00 AM and completed successfully. There have been no changes to the system or workload recently. The team suspects a performance degradation. What is the MOST likely cause of the issue?

Clue words in this question

Noticing these words before you look at the options changes how you read each choice.

Clue: "most likely"
Why it matters: Probability qualifier — the question wants the most probable cause or outcome, not a guaranteed one. Eliminate low-probability options.

A
The HANA database has reached its memory limit due to the global.ini allocation.
Why wrong: Incorrect. HANA dynamically manages memory within OS limits; high memory usage is a result of the stalled transactions, not the cause.
B
The gp3 volume's baseline IOPS are insufficient for the current workload.
Why wrong: Incorrect. While the disk queue length is high, the underlying issue is the log volume being nearly full, which halts transactions; insufficient IOPS would not directly cause transaction stalling.
C
A backup job is running and consuming CPU and I/O resources.
Why wrong: Incorrect. Backups are scheduled at 2:00 AM and completed successfully; no backup is running at 3:00 PM.
D
The log volume is almost full, causing HANA to stall transaction processing.
Correct. A nearly full log volume forces HANA to pause transaction processing, leading to increased CPU/memory utilization and application timeouts.

Full breakdown with real-world context →

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 log volume is almost full, causing HANA to stall transaction processing.

The most likely cause is that the HANA log volume is almost full (95% used). When the log area reaches capacity, SAP HANA suspends transaction processing to prevent log overflow, leading to timeouts and increased CPU/memory usage as transactions queue. Option D correctly identifies this. Option A is incorrect because HANA's memory management is dynamic and not constrained by global.ini limits. Option B is incorrect because the gp3 volumes have baseline IOPS of 3000, which is sufficient, and the symptom is log volume full, not I/O performance. Option C is incorrect because backups completed at 2:00 AM, hours before the issue.

Key principle: OSPF neighbour adjacency depends on matching area, hello/dead timers, network type, and authentication — IP reachability alone is not enough.

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 HANA database has reached its memory limit due to the global.ini allocation.
Why it's wrong here
Incorrect. HANA dynamically manages memory within OS limits; high memory usage is a result of the stalled transactions, not the cause.
✗
The gp3 volume's baseline IOPS are insufficient for the current workload.
Why it's wrong here
Incorrect. While the disk queue length is high, the underlying issue is the log volume being nearly full, which halts transactions; insufficient IOPS would not directly cause transaction stalling.
✗
A backup job is running and consuming CPU and I/O resources.
Why it's wrong here
Incorrect. Backups are scheduled at 2:00 AM and completed successfully; no backup is running at 3:00 PM.
✓
The log volume is almost full, causing HANA to stall transaction processing.
Why this is correct
Correct. A nearly full log volume forces HANA to pause transaction processing, leading to increased CPU/memory utilization and application timeouts.
Clue confirmation
The clue word "most likely" in the question point toward this answer.
Related concept
OSPF neighbours must agree on key parameters.

Common exam traps

Common exam trap: OSPF can fail even when IP connectivity looks correct

OSPF neighbour formation depends on matching areas, timers, network type, authentication and passive-interface behaviour. Do not choose an answer only because the devices can ping.

Detailed technical explanation

How to think about this question

OSPF questions usually test the details that control adjacency and route selection. Read the neighbour state, area, router ID and interface configuration before deciding what is wrong.

KKey Concepts to Remember

OSPF neighbours must agree on key parameters.
Router ID selection can affect neighbour relationships and LSDB output.
OSPF cost influences the preferred path.
A route can appear in OSPF information but not become the installed route.

TExam Day Tips

Check area mismatch first when OSPF adjacency fails.
Review passive interfaces when a network is advertised but no neighbour forms.
Use show ip ospf neighbor and show ip route clues carefully.

Key takeaway

OSPF neighbour adjacency depends on matching area, hello/dead timers, network type, and authentication — IP reachability alone is not enough.

Real-world example

How this comes up in practice

An e-commerce site experiences heavy traffic on Black Friday and near-zero traffic during off-peak weeks. Rather than provisioning permanent large VMs, the team uses auto-scaling groups that add capacity automatically under load and reduce it overnight. Questions like this test whether you understand elasticity, availability zones, and cloud compute scaling patterns.

What to study next

Got this wrong? Here's your next step.

Review OSPF neighbour requirements — matching area type, hello and dead timers, network type, stub flags, and authentication. Study show ip ospf neighbor states (INIT, 2-WAY, FULL). Then practise related PAS-C01 OSPF questions on adjacency and route selection.

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FAQ

Questions learners often ask

What does this PAS-C01 question test?

Operations and Maintenance — This question tests Operations and Maintenance — OSPF neighbours must agree on key parameters..

What is the correct answer to this question?

The correct answer is: The log volume is almost full, causing HANA to stall transaction processing. — The most likely cause is that the HANA log volume is almost full (95% used). When the log area reaches capacity, SAP HANA suspends transaction processing to prevent log overflow, leading to timeouts and increased CPU/memory usage as transactions queue. Option D correctly identifies this. Option A is incorrect because HANA's memory management is dynamic and not constrained by global.ini limits. Option B is incorrect because the gp3 volumes have baseline IOPS of 3000, which is sufficient, and the symptom is log volume full, not I/O performance. Option C is incorrect because backups completed at 2:00 AM, hours before the issue.

What should I do if I get this PAS-C01 question wrong?

Are there clue words in this question I should notice?

Yes — watch for: "most likely". Probability qualifier — the question wants the most probable cause or outcome, not a guaranteed one. Eliminate low-probability options.

What is the key concept behind this question?

OSPF neighbours must agree on key parameters.

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