AZ-104 Monitor and Maintain Azure Resources Practice Question
This AZ-104 practice question tests your understanding of monitor and maintain azure resources. This is a configuration task: choose the command set that satisfies every stated requirement. Small differences — like 'secret' vs 'password' or 'transport input ssh' vs 'all' — change whether the answer is correct. 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.
You need to be notified whenever the average CPU usage of VM-App01 exceeds 80 percent for 10 minutes. The solution must send an email to the operations team automatically. What should you configure?
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
✓
Create an Azure Monitor metric alert and link it to an action group.
Option A is correct because Azure Monitor metric alerts can evaluate performance counters like CPU usage over a specified time window (e.g., 10 minutes) and trigger an action group when the threshold (80%) is exceeded. The action group can be configured with an email notification to the operations team, meeting the requirement automatically.
Key principle: Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Answer analysis
Option-by-option breakdown
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
✓
Create an Azure Monitor metric alert and link it to an action group.
Why this is correct
This is the standard way to send automated notifications based on CPU thresholds.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
✗
Create an Azure Advisor recommendation alert.
Why it's wrong here
Azure Advisor gives recommendations and is not used for real-time CPU threshold alerting.
✗
Create an activity log alert for the virtual machine.
Why it's wrong here
Activity log alerts track management operations, not guest or platform performance metrics like CPU percentage.
✗
Create a subscription budget alert.
Why it's wrong here
Budget alerts are used for cost management, not VM performance monitoring.
Common exam traps
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
The trap here is confusing activity log alerts (which track management-plane operations) with metric alerts (which track performance data), leading candidates to choose Option C when they need real-time metric-based monitoring.
Detailed technical explanation
How to think about this question
Azure Monitor metric alerts use a multi-dimensional metric signal (e.g., Percentage CPU) with a dynamic or static threshold and an aggregation granularity (e.g., 10-minute average). The alert rule evaluates the metric every 1 minute using a sliding window, and when the condition is met, it fires and invokes the linked action group, which can send email, SMS, or webhook notifications. A common nuance is that the 'evaluation frequency' and 'window size' must be configured correctly to avoid alert fatigue or missed detections.
KKey Concepts to Remember
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
Find the constraint that changes the correct option.
Eliminate answers that are true in general but not in this case.
TExam Day Tips
→Watch for words such as best, first, most likely and least administrative effort.
→Review why wrong options are wrong, not only why the correct option is correct.
Key takeaway
Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
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.
Related glossary terms
Concepts from this question explained
These glossary pages explain the core terms tested in this AZ-104 question in full detail.
Monitor and Maintain Azure Resources — This question tests Monitor and Maintain Azure Resources — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Create an Azure Monitor metric alert and link it to an action group. — Option A is correct because Azure Monitor metric alerts can evaluate performance counters like CPU usage over a specified time window (e.g., 10 minutes) and trigger an action group when the threshold (80%) is exceeded. The action group can be configured with an email notification to the operations team, meeting the requirement automatically.
What should I do if I get this AZ-104 question wrong?
Identify which exam domain this question belongs to, review the core concept, then practise similar questions from the same domain.
What is the key concept behind this question?
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
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Question Discussion
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