hardMultiple ChoiceObjective-mapped
CV0-004 Practice Question: A cloud operations team is troubleshooting a…
A cloud operations team is troubleshooting a performance issue with a database that is running on a virtual machine. The database is experiencing high latency during peak hours. Metrics show that CPU and memory usage are below 50%, but disk I/O latency spikes. The database is hosted on a cloud provider's virtual machine with premium SSDs. Which of the following is the MOST likely cause of the disk I/O latency?
⚠ Common exam trap
A common trap is to attribute high disk I/O latency to memory pressure (paging), but since memory usage is low, the real cause is hitting the disk's IOPS ceiling.
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 disk IOPS limit is being exceeded during peak loads.
Premium SSDs have defined IOPS limits that, when exceeded during peak loads, cause disk I/O latency spikes. Since CPU and memory are below 50%, the bottleneck is at the storage layer, not compute or memory. The high latency indicates the disk queue depth is growing as requests exceed the provisioned IOPS cap, leading to queuing delays.
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 OS is paging memory to disk due to insufficient RAM.
Why it's wrong here
Memory usage is below 50%, so paging is unlikely.
- ✗
The virtual machine's network bandwidth is saturated.
Why it's wrong here
Network saturation would affect network latency, not disk I/O directly.
- ✓
The disk IOPS limit is being exceeded during peak loads.
Why this is correct
Exceeding provisioned IOPS results in throttling, causing increased latency.
- ✗
The database application is CPU-bound.
Why it's wrong here
CPU usage is below 50%, so CPU is not the bottleneck.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
This CV0-004 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 CV0-004 exam.