An SAP system on AWS is using Amazon EBS volumes for the database. The company wants to take crash-consistent snapshots of the entire database volume set. Which approach is recommended?
AWS Backup can create crash-consistent snapshots across volumes.
Why this answer
AWS Backup with pre- and post-scripts for volume groups is the recommended approach because it orchestrates crash-consistent snapshots across multiple EBS volumes by freezing the application (e.g., SAP HANA) and flushing I/O before the snapshot, then unfreezing after. This ensures all volumes are captured at the same point in time without downtime, which is critical for SAP databases requiring consistency across the entire volume set.
Exam trap
The trap here is that candidates assume taking snapshots simultaneously (Option C) guarantees crash consistency, but EBS snapshots are initiated asynchronously and do not capture a point-in-time across multiple volumes without application-level coordination.
How to eliminate wrong answers
Option A is wrong because stopping the instance causes downtime, which is unnecessary and disruptive for production SAP workloads; crash-consistent snapshots can be achieved without stopping the instance. Option B is wrong because EBS Multi-Attach is designed for shared volumes in clustered environments, not for taking consistent snapshots across a volume set, and attaching volumes to a backup instance does not guarantee crash consistency. Option C is wrong because taking snapshots of each volume individually at the same time does not guarantee crash consistency; EBS snapshots are asynchronous and may capture data at slightly different points, leading to inconsistencies across volumes.