AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate (SAA-C02) — Question 647

A rapidly growing ecommerce company is running its workloads in a single AWS Region. A solutions architect must create a disaster recovery (DR) strategy that includes a different AWS Region. The company wants its database to be up to date in the DR Region with the least possible latency. The remaining infrastructure in the DR Region needs to run at reduced capacity and must be able to scale up if necessary.
Which solution will meet these requirements with the LOWEST recovery time objective (RTO)?

Answer options

• A. Use an Amazon Aurora global database with a pilot light deployment.
• B. Use an Amazon Aurora global database with a warm standby deployment.
• C. Use an Amazon RDS Multi-AZ DB instance with a pilot light deployment.
• D. Use an Amazon RDS Multi-AZ DB instance with a warm standby deployment.

Correct answer: B

Explanation

An Amazon Aurora global database provides fast, storage-based cross-region replication with latency of less than one second, satisfying the requirement for minimal database replication delay. A warm standby deployment maintains a scaled-down but fully functional version of the infrastructure, offering a significantly lower RTO than a pilot light deployment where resources must be started up from scratch. Amazon RDS Multi-AZ is designed for high availability within a single region, making Aurora global database the superior choice for cross-region disaster recovery with low latency.