mediumMultiple Choice
XK0-006 A database server is running slow Practice Question
A database server is running slow. The administrator uses iostat and notices high await times on the disk. Which of the following best explains the implication of high await?
⚠ Common exam trap
Test-takers frequently confuse 'await' with CPU wait time (iowait) or assume it directly indicates disk fullness, when in fact await is a pure I/O completion latency metric that can be high due to queueing, slow media, or controller issues.
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
✓
Disk I/O requests are taking a long time to complete.
In iostat, 'await' measures the average time (in milliseconds) for I/O requests to be served by the disk, including time spent in the queue and the actual service time. A high await value indicates that disk I/O requests are taking a long time to complete, which directly explains the database server's slowness due to disk latency.
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 CPU is waiting too long for memory access.
Why it's wrong here
Await is an I/O metric reported per block device by iostat, quantifying time from request submission to completion; memory-access stalls appear as CPU cache-miss or stall counters, not disk await. CPU-memory contention is tempting because it also slows database queries, but it would be diagnosed with perf or vmstat, not iostat's device columns.
- ✓
Disk I/O requests are taking a long time to complete.
Why this is correct
await measures the average time in milliseconds for I/O requests issued to the device to be served, including queue wait. High values therefore indicate requests are completing slowly, pointing to disk saturation or latency rather than throughput or capacity problems.
- ✗
The disk is almost full, causing fragmentation.
Why it's wrong here
Await reflects request service and queue time, not capacity; a nearly full disk causes write failures or fragmentation-related seeks, which would surface as elevated %util or throughput changes rather than await alone. Capacity exhaustion is tempting because full filesystems do degrade databases, but the metric here is latency, so free-space checks are a separate diagnostic step.
- ✗
The network filesystem is experiencing latency.
Why it's wrong here
High await measures the average time for I/O requests issued to a block device to complete, including queue wait; iostat reports per-device statistics and does not measure NFS round-trip latency, which requires nfsstat or mountstats. Network filesystem latency is tempting because remote storage also produces slow I/O, but that diagnosis needs network-layer tooling, not local disk await.
Go deeper
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Key term
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Key term
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Value is the perceived worth, benefit, or usefulness that a service, product, or activity delivers to stakeholders, especially customers and the business.
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Written by Johnson Ajibi, MSc IT Security
Senior Network & Security Engineer · founder of Courseiva
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