The correct answer is to configure SAP HANA System Replication with automatic failover to a secondary HANA instance in another Availability Zone. This solution meets the requirement for SAP HANA high availability with automatic failover and zero RPO because synchronous replication ensures every committed transaction is written to the secondary instance before acknowledgment, guaranteeing no data loss, while the automatic takeover mechanism achieves an RTO well under five minutes by eliminating manual intervention. On the AWS Certified SAP on AWS Specialty PAS-C01 exam, this scenario tests your understanding of how to architect cross-AZ database resilience without relying on shared storage, as EBS Multi-Attach does not support active/passive failover across zones and manual failover violates the strict RTO. A common trap is assuming a larger single instance or manual replication provides high availability, but only system replication with automatic takeover delivers both the required RPO and RTO. Remember the mnemonic: “Sync for zero, auto for speed” — synchronous replication for zero RPO, automatic takeover for fast RTO.
PAS-C01 Design of SAP Workloads on AWS Practice Question
This PAS-C01 practice question tests your understanding of design of sap workloads on aws. Match the stated requirement to the specific cloud service, access model, or configuration option — many options are valid in isolation but not for this scenario. 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 has deployed SAP S/4HANA on AWS using a single EC2 instance for the HANA database and multiple EC2 instances for the application servers. The system is in production and the company wants to implement high availability for the HANA database to minimize downtime during patching and failures. The HANA database is critical and must have an RTO of less than 5 minutes and an RPO of zero. The current setup uses a single EBS volume for /hana/data and another for /hana/log. The company has two Availability Zones available. Which solution meets the requirements?
Clue words in this question
Noticing these words before you look at the options changes how you read each choice.
Clue: "minimum / minimize"
Why it matters: Asks for the least resource use — fewest addresses, smallest subnet, lowest overhead. Eliminate over-provisioned options even if they would technically work.
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Configure SAP HANA System Replication with automatic failover to a secondary HANA instance in another AZ.
Option B is correct because SAP HANA System Replication in active/passive mode with automatic failover provides near-zero RPO and fast RTO. Option A is wrong because manual failover takes longer than 5 minutes. Option C is wrong because EBS Multi-Attach does not support active/passive cross-AZ. Option D is wrong because a larger instance does not provide HA.
Key principle: NAT direction and interface roles matter as much as the IP address mapping. Inside/outside designation controls which traffic is translated.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
✓
Configure SAP HANA System Replication with automatic failover to a secondary HANA instance in another AZ.
Why this is correct
Synchronous replication provides zero RPO and fast failover.
Clue confirmation
The clue word "minimum / minimize" in the question point toward this answer.
Related concept
Static NAT maps one inside address to one outside address.
✗
Attach the EBS volumes to two EC2 instances using EBS Multi-Attach.
Why it's wrong here
Multi-Attach does not support cross-AZ.
✗
Use AWS Backup to schedule snapshots every 5 minutes and restore in another AZ if needed.
Why it's wrong here
Restore time exceeds 5 minutes; RPO >0.
✗
Deploy the HANA database on a larger EC2 instance with higher availability SLA.
Why it's wrong here
Instance SLA does not guarantee HA.
Common exam traps
Common exam trap: NAT rules depend on direction and matching traffic
NAT is not only about the public address. The inside/outside interface roles and the ACL or rule that matches traffic are just as important.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
NAT questions usually test address translation, overload/PAT behaviour, static mappings and whether the right traffic is being translated. Read the interface direction and address terms carefully.
KKey Concepts to Remember
Static NAT maps one inside address to one outside address.
PAT allows many inside hosts to share one public address using ports.
Inside local and inside global describe the private and translated addresses.
NAT ACLs identify traffic for translation, not always security filtering.
TExam Day Tips
→Identify inside and outside interfaces first.
→Check whether the scenario needs static NAT, dynamic NAT or PAT.
→Do not confuse NAT matching ACLs with normal packet-filtering intent.
Key takeaway
NAT direction and interface roles matter as much as the IP address mapping. Inside/outside designation controls which traffic is translated.
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 the four NAT address types (inside local, inside global, outside local, outside global), PAT port overload, and static vs dynamic NAT use cases. Then practise related PAS-C01 NAT questions on configuration and troubleshooting.
Design of SAP Workloads on AWS — This question tests Design of SAP Workloads on AWS — Static NAT maps one inside address to one outside address..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Configure SAP HANA System Replication with automatic failover to a secondary HANA instance in another AZ. — Option B is correct because SAP HANA System Replication in active/passive mode with automatic failover provides near-zero RPO and fast RTO. Option A is wrong because manual failover takes longer than 5 minutes. Option C is wrong because EBS Multi-Attach does not support active/passive cross-AZ. Option D is wrong because a larger instance does not provide HA.
What should I do if I get this PAS-C01 question wrong?
Review the four NAT address types (inside local, inside global, outside local, outside global), PAT port overload, and static vs dynamic NAT use cases. Then practise related PAS-C01 NAT questions on configuration and troubleshooting.
Are there clue words in this question I should notice?
Yes — watch for: "minimum / minimize". Asks for the least resource use — fewest addresses, smallest subnet, lowest overhead. Eliminate over-provisioned options even if they would technically work.
What is the key concept behind this question?
Static NAT maps one inside address to one outside address.
About these practice questions
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These questions test the same concept from different angles. Work through them to make sure you can recognise it however the exam phrases it.
Variation 1. A company is running a large SAP S/4HANA production system on AWS. The system consists of a single HANA database instance running on an r5.24xlarge EC2 instance (with 768 GB of RAM), and multiple application server instances behind an Application Load Balancer. The database uses six EBS io1 volumes for data and log files, each with 20,000 provisioned IOPS. The application servers are in an Auto Scaling group. Recently, the company experienced a prolonged database outage when the primary EC2 instance failed. The recovery took over 4 hours because a new instance had to be launched and snapshots restored. The company wants to improve the Recovery Time Objective (RTO) to less than 30 minutes for the HANA database. They also want to minimize data loss with an RPO of less than 5 minutes. The company has a second AWS region (us-west-2) available for disaster recovery but prefers to keep costs low for the DR site. Which solution should the company implement?
hard
A.Configure SAP HANA System Replication to a standby instance in the same region but use a larger instance to ensure capacity.
B.Configure automated Amazon EBS snapshots every 5 minutes and create an AMI for the HANA instance. In the event of a failure, launch a new instance from the AMI in the same Availability Zone.
✓ C.Set up SAP HANA System Replication to a standby HANA instance in a different Availability Zone. Use a smaller instance type for the standby to reduce costs. Automate failover using a cluster manager like Pacemaker.
D.Use Amazon RDS for SAP HANA with Multi-AZ deployment to automatically failover to a standby in another Availability Zone.
Why C: Option C is correct because SAP HANA System Replication (HSR) provides near-synchronous replication with a typical RPO of seconds and can be configured with automatic takeover to a standby instance in another Availability Zone. The standby can be a smaller instance (e.g., r5.12xlarge) to reduce costs. The takeover can be automated with Pacemaker, achieving RTO of minutes. Option A is incorrect because a new EC2 instance launch and snapshot restore cannot achieve 30-minute RTO. Option B is incorrect because Multi-AZ RDS is not for HANA. Option D is incorrect because HSR to a smaller instance in the same region provides DR but does not use the second region as specified.
Last reviewed: Jun 20, 2026
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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.
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