High Availability (HA): Automatic VM Restart on Alternate Host After Physical Host Failure
A company runs a cluster of hosts running a Type 1 hypervisor. The virtual machines (VMs) are configured to ensure that if a physical host fails, the VMs running on that host will be automatically restarted on another host in the cluster. Which feature provides this capability?
Quick Answer
The answer is High Availability (HA). This is correct because HA is specifically designed to detect a physical host failure through continuous heartbeat monitoring between hosts and the management server, then automatically restart the affected virtual machines on a surviving host within the cluster, ensuring minimal downtime without manual intervention. On the CompTIA A+ Core 1 220-1101 exam, this concept tests your understanding of virtualization clustering features, where a common trap is confusing HA with fault tolerance—remember that fault tolerance keeps a mirrored VM running in lockstep for zero downtime, while HA accepts a brief restart delay. The key distinction is that HA restarts VMs after failure, whereas fault tolerance prevents interruption entirely. For the exam, think of HA as “automatic restart” and fault tolerance as “instant failover.” A helpful memory tip: HA is like a spare tire—you stop, swap it, and keep going; fault tolerance is like a run-flat tire that never goes flat.
⚠ Common exam trap
Many candidates confuse High Availability with Fault Tolerance, mistakenly thinking FT restarts VMs after a failure, when in fact FT maintains a running secondary VM and does not involve restarting—HA is the correct answer for automatic restart after host failure.
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
✓
High Availability (HA)
High Availability (HA) is the correct feature because it is designed to automatically restart virtual machines on alternate hosts within a cluster when a physical host fails. HA uses heartbeat monitoring between hosts and the management server to detect failures, then triggers the restart of affected VMs on surviving hosts, ensuring minimal downtime without requiring manual intervention.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
- ✗
vMotion
Why it's wrong here
vMotion migrates a running VM between hosts while it stays powered on, which prevents downtime but does not restart VMs after a host failure. It is tempting because it moves workloads across hosts, and would be correct for planned maintenance or manual load balancing.
- ✓
High Availability (HA)
Why this is correct
High Availability clustering continuously monitors host health and restarts affected VMs on surviving cluster members when a physical host fails. This satisfies the automatic-restart constraint, unlike manual vMotion or DRS, which handle load balancing and planned migration rather than unplanned host loss.
- ✗
Fault Tolerance (FT)
Why it's wrong here
Fault Tolerance maintains a live shadow copy on a second host, so a failure causes failover with no restart and no downtime; the stem requires VMs to be restarted elsewhere. It is tempting because both features address host failure, and FT would be correct for continuous availability of a single critical VM.
- ✗
Distributed Resource Scheduler (DRS)
Why it's wrong here
DRS balances CPU and memory load by placing and migrating VMs across hosts; it does not detect a failed host and restart its VMs. It is tempting because it operates cluster-wide, and would be correct for automated initial placement and resource-balancing decisions.
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Same concept, more angles
2 more ways this is tested on 220-1101
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 runs a critical web server on a virtual machine hosted on a Type 1 hypervisor cluster. The cluster consists of two physical hosts connected to a shared storage array. The IT manager requires that if one host fails, the VM should automatically restart on the other host without manual intervention. Which virtualization feature should be configured?
medium- A.Live Migration
- B.Fault Tolerance
- ✓ C.High Availability
- D.Load Balancing
Why C: High Availability (HA) is the correct feature because it automatically restarts a virtual machine on a surviving host in a cluster when the original host fails, without requiring manual intervention. This is achieved by monitoring heartbeat signals between hosts and the shared storage; if a host stops responding, HA triggers the VM restart on another host. The scenario explicitly requires automatic restart on host failure, which is the primary function of HA in a Type 1 hypervisor cluster.
Variation 2. A company runs critical virtual machines on a single physical server. The IT manager wants to ensure that if the physical server fails, the virtual machines continue to run automatically on another server with minimal downtime. Which feature should be configured on the virtualization platform?
medium- A.Resource pooling
- ✓ B.High availability
- C.Virtual desktop infrastructure
- D.Virtual machine snapshots
Why B: High Availability (HA) is the correct feature because it automatically restarts virtual machines on a surviving host within a cluster when a physical server fails. HA uses heartbeat monitoring between hosts and, upon detecting a loss of heartbeat, triggers the VMs to be powered on elsewhere, achieving minimal downtime without manual intervention.
JA
Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This 220-1101 practice question is part of Courseiva's free CompTIA 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 220-1101 exam.