A company runs a critical line-of-business application on Azure VMs within a single region. The application tier is deployed across multiple VMs. They need to protect against a failure of an entire Azure datacenter within that region. The solution should automatically distribute the VMs across physically separate locations with independent power, cooling, and networking. The company also requires the lowest possible latency between application and database tiers within the same location. Which deployment strategy should they use?
Answer choices
Why each option matters
Good practice is not just finding the correct option. The wrong answers often show the exact trap the exam wants you to fall into.
Best answer
Deploy the VMs across multiple availability zones
Availability zones provide datacenter-level redundancy within a region. By placing VMs in different zones, the application can survive a single datacenter failure. This also allows low latency within the same zone for the database tier.
Distractor review
Deploy the VMs in an availability set
Availability sets protect against hardware failures within a single datacenter (by spreading VMs across update and fault domains) but do not protect against an entire datacenter failure.
Distractor review
Use Azure Site Recovery to replicate VMs to a paired region
Site Recovery replicates to a different region, which adds latency and complexity. The requirement is to protect against a datacenter failure within the same region, not a regional failure.
Distractor review
Use Azure Proximity Placement Groups
Proximity Placement Groups reduce network latency between VMs but do not provide redundancy against a datacenter failure.
Common exam trap
Common exam trap: answer the scenario, not the keyword
Many certification questions include familiar terms but test a specific constraint. Read the exact wording before choosing an answer that is generally true but wrong for this case.
Technical deep dive
How to think about this question
This question should be treated as a scenario, not a definition check. Identify the problem, the constraint and the best action. Then compare each option against those facts.
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.
- Use explanations to understand the rule behind the answer.
TExam Day Tips
- Underline the problem statement mentally.
- 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.
Related practice questions
Related AZ-305 practice-question pages
Use these pages to review the topic behind this question. This is how one missed question becomes focused revision.
SAA-C03 VPC practice questions
Practise AZ-305 questions linked to SAA-C03 VPC.
SAA-C03 S3 lifecycle policy questions
Practise AZ-305 questions linked to SAA-C03 S3 lifecycle policy questions.
SAA-C03 RDS Multi-AZ questions
Practise AZ-305 questions linked to SAA-C03 RDS Multi-AZ questions.
SAA-C03 IAM policy practice questions
Practise AZ-305 questions linked to SAA-C03 IAM policy.
SAA-C03 Route 53 failover questions
Practise AZ-305 questions linked to SAA-C03 Route 53 failover questions.
SAA-C03 CloudFront practice questions
Practise AZ-305 questions linked to SAA-C03 CloudFront.
SAA-C03 NAT gateway questions
Practise AZ-305 questions linked to SAA-C03 NAT gateway questions.
SAA-C03 VPC endpoint questions
Practise AZ-305 questions linked to SAA-C03 VPC endpoint questions.
SAA-C03 Auto Scaling practice questions
Practise AZ-305 questions linked to SAA-C03 Auto Scaling.
SAA-C03 disaster recovery questions
Practise AZ-305 questions linked to SAA-C03 disaster recovery questions.
SAA-C03 high availability questions
Practise AZ-305 questions linked to SAA-C03 high availability questions.
SAA-C03 cost optimization questions
Practise AZ-305 questions linked to SAA-C03 cost optimization questions.
More questions from this exam
Keep practising from the same exam bank, or move into a focused topic page if this question exposed a weak area.
Question 1
A company is designing hub-and-spoke networking. Spoke VNets must use a central Azure Firewall for outbound internet traffic. Which two configurations are required?
Question 2
A company is designing private access to a PaaS database from workloads in a VNet. The database should not be reachable over its public endpoint. What should be recommended?
Question 3
A data platform must support analytical queries over petabytes of files in a data lake, while preserving hierarchical namespaces and fine-grained ACLs. Which storage service should you design around?
Question 4
A database workload has an RPO of 15 minutes and an RTO of 4 hours. Cost is more important than near-zero data loss. Which design is usually more appropriate than synchronous multi-region replication?
Question 5
A hub-and-spoke Azure network must centralize outbound inspection and still allow spokes to resolve private endpoint DNS names. Which two components are commonly required? (Choose 2.)
Question 6
A multinational company uses Microsoft Entra ID and several Azure subscriptions. Security administrators need to review privileged role assignments every month and require justification for continued access. Which design should be recommended?
FAQ
Questions learners often ask
What does this AZ-305 question test?
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
What is the correct answer to this question?
The correct answer is: Deploy the VMs across multiple availability zones — Availability zones are physically separate datacenters within an Azure region, each with independent power, cooling, and networking. Deploying VMs across availability zones provides protection against a datacenter failure. Availability sets protect against faults within a single datacenter but not against a full datacenter failure. Azure Site Recovery is for cross-region DR, not within a region. Azure Proximity Placement Groups reduce latency but do not provide datacenter-level redundancy.
What should I do if I get this AZ-305 question wrong?
Then try more questions from the same exam bank and focus on understanding why the wrong options are tempting.
Discussion
Sign in to join the discussion.