AWS CERTIFIED SOLUTIONS ARCHITECT ASSOCIATE
PRACTICE EXAM (SAA-C03) EXPECTED QUESTIONS
WITH VERIFIED ANSWERS
Question 1.
A company runs an application that uses an Amazon RDS PostgreSQL database. The database is
currently not encrypted. A Solutions Architect has been instructed that due to new compliance
requirements all existing and new data in the database must be encrypted. The database experiences
high volumes of changes and no data can be lost.
How can the Solutions Architect enable encryption for the database without incurring any data loss?
ANSWER
Create a snapshot of the existing RDS DB instance. Create an encrypted copy of the snapshot.
Create a new RDS DB instance from the encrypted snapshot and update the application. Use
AWS DMS to synchronize data between the source and destination RDS DBs.
Question 2.
A company runs a dynamic website that is hosted on an on-premises server in the United States. The
company is expanding to Europe and is investigating how they can optimize the performance of the
website for European users. The website's backed must remain in the United States. The company
requires a solution that can be implemented within a few days.
What should a Solutions Architect recommend?
ANSWER
Use Amazon CloudFront with a custom origin pointing to the on-premises servers.
Question 3.
A video production company is planning to move some of its workloads to the AWS Cloud. The
company will require around 5 TB of storage for video processing with the maximum possible I/O
performance. They also require over 400 TB of extremely durable stor- age for storing video files and
800 TB of storage for long-term archival.
Which combinations of services should a Solutions Architect use to meet these requirements?
ANSWER
Amazon EC2 instance store for maximum performance, Amazon S3 for durable data storage,
and Amazon S3 Glacier for archival storage.
,Question 4.
An eCommerce application consists of three tiers.
The web tier includes EC2 instances behind an Application Load balancer, the middle tier uses EC2
instances and an Amazon SQS queue to process orders, and the database tier consists of an Auto
Scaling DynamoDB table. During busy periods customers have complained about delays in the
processing of orders.
A Solutions Architect has been tasked with reducing processing times.
Which action will be MOST effective in accomplishing this requirement?
ANSWER
i. Use Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling to scale out
ii. the middle tier instances based on the SQS queue depth.
Question 5.
A web application allows users to upload photos and add graphical elements to them. The application
offers two tiers of service: free and paid. Photos uploaded by paid users should be processed before
those submitted using the free tier. The photos are uploaded to an Amazon S3 bucket which uses an
event notification to send the job information to Amazon SQS.
How should a Solutions Architect configure the Amazon SQS deployment to meet these requirements?
ANSWER
Use a separate SQS Standard queue for each tier. Configure Amazon EC2 instances to prioritize
polling for the paid queue over the free queue
Question 6.
An insurance company has a web application that serves users in the United Kingdom and Australia.
The application includes a database tier using a MySQL database hosted in eu-west-2. The web tier
runs from eu-west-2 and ap-southeast-2. Amazon Route 53 geo-proximity routing is used to direct
users to the clos- est web tier. It has been noted that Australian users receive slow response times to
queries.
Which changes should be made to the database tier to improve performance?
ANSWER
Migrate the database to an Amazon Aurora global database in MySQL compatibility mode.
Configure read replicas in ap-southeast-2
, Question 7.
An application is being created that will use Amazon EC2 instances to generate and store data.
Another set of EC2 instances will then analyze and modify the data. Storage requirements will be
significant and will continue to grow over time. The application architects require a storage solution.
Which actions would meet these needs?
ANSWER
Store the data in an Amazon EFS filesystem. Mount the file system on the application instances
Question 8.
A company requires that all AWS IAM user accounts have specific complexity requirements and
minimum password length.
How should a Solutions Architect accomplish this?
ANSWER
Set a password policy for the entire AWS account.
Question 9.
An Amazon VPC contains several Amazon EC2 instances. The instances need to make API calls to
Amazon DynamoDB. A solutions architect needs to ensure that the API calls do not traverse the
internet.
How can this be accomplished? (Select TWO.)
ANSWER
1) Create a gateway endpoint for DynamoDB
2) Create a route table entry for the endpoint
Question 10.
An Amazon RDS Read Replica is being deployed in a separate region. The master database is not
encrypted but all data in the new region must be encrypted. How can this be achieved?
ANSWER
Encrypt a snapshot from the master DB instance, create a new encrypted master DB instance,
and then create an encrypted cross-region Read Replica
PRACTICE EXAM (SAA-C03) EXPECTED QUESTIONS
WITH VERIFIED ANSWERS
Question 1.
A company runs an application that uses an Amazon RDS PostgreSQL database. The database is
currently not encrypted. A Solutions Architect has been instructed that due to new compliance
requirements all existing and new data in the database must be encrypted. The database experiences
high volumes of changes and no data can be lost.
How can the Solutions Architect enable encryption for the database without incurring any data loss?
ANSWER
Create a snapshot of the existing RDS DB instance. Create an encrypted copy of the snapshot.
Create a new RDS DB instance from the encrypted snapshot and update the application. Use
AWS DMS to synchronize data between the source and destination RDS DBs.
Question 2.
A company runs a dynamic website that is hosted on an on-premises server in the United States. The
company is expanding to Europe and is investigating how they can optimize the performance of the
website for European users. The website's backed must remain in the United States. The company
requires a solution that can be implemented within a few days.
What should a Solutions Architect recommend?
ANSWER
Use Amazon CloudFront with a custom origin pointing to the on-premises servers.
Question 3.
A video production company is planning to move some of its workloads to the AWS Cloud. The
company will require around 5 TB of storage for video processing with the maximum possible I/O
performance. They also require over 400 TB of extremely durable stor- age for storing video files and
800 TB of storage for long-term archival.
Which combinations of services should a Solutions Architect use to meet these requirements?
ANSWER
Amazon EC2 instance store for maximum performance, Amazon S3 for durable data storage,
and Amazon S3 Glacier for archival storage.
,Question 4.
An eCommerce application consists of three tiers.
The web tier includes EC2 instances behind an Application Load balancer, the middle tier uses EC2
instances and an Amazon SQS queue to process orders, and the database tier consists of an Auto
Scaling DynamoDB table. During busy periods customers have complained about delays in the
processing of orders.
A Solutions Architect has been tasked with reducing processing times.
Which action will be MOST effective in accomplishing this requirement?
ANSWER
i. Use Amazon EC2 Auto Scaling to scale out
ii. the middle tier instances based on the SQS queue depth.
Question 5.
A web application allows users to upload photos and add graphical elements to them. The application
offers two tiers of service: free and paid. Photos uploaded by paid users should be processed before
those submitted using the free tier. The photos are uploaded to an Amazon S3 bucket which uses an
event notification to send the job information to Amazon SQS.
How should a Solutions Architect configure the Amazon SQS deployment to meet these requirements?
ANSWER
Use a separate SQS Standard queue for each tier. Configure Amazon EC2 instances to prioritize
polling for the paid queue over the free queue
Question 6.
An insurance company has a web application that serves users in the United Kingdom and Australia.
The application includes a database tier using a MySQL database hosted in eu-west-2. The web tier
runs from eu-west-2 and ap-southeast-2. Amazon Route 53 geo-proximity routing is used to direct
users to the clos- est web tier. It has been noted that Australian users receive slow response times to
queries.
Which changes should be made to the database tier to improve performance?
ANSWER
Migrate the database to an Amazon Aurora global database in MySQL compatibility mode.
Configure read replicas in ap-southeast-2
, Question 7.
An application is being created that will use Amazon EC2 instances to generate and store data.
Another set of EC2 instances will then analyze and modify the data. Storage requirements will be
significant and will continue to grow over time. The application architects require a storage solution.
Which actions would meet these needs?
ANSWER
Store the data in an Amazon EFS filesystem. Mount the file system on the application instances
Question 8.
A company requires that all AWS IAM user accounts have specific complexity requirements and
minimum password length.
How should a Solutions Architect accomplish this?
ANSWER
Set a password policy for the entire AWS account.
Question 9.
An Amazon VPC contains several Amazon EC2 instances. The instances need to make API calls to
Amazon DynamoDB. A solutions architect needs to ensure that the API calls do not traverse the
internet.
How can this be accomplished? (Select TWO.)
ANSWER
1) Create a gateway endpoint for DynamoDB
2) Create a route table entry for the endpoint
Question 10.
An Amazon RDS Read Replica is being deployed in a separate region. The master database is not
encrypted but all data in the new region must be encrypted. How can this be achieved?
ANSWER
Encrypt a snapshot from the master DB instance, create a new encrypted master DB instance,
and then create an encrypted cross-region Read Replica
