AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Professional — Question 568

A company wants to migrate an application to Amazon EC2 from VMware Infrastructure that runs in an on-premises data center. A solutions architect must preserve the software and configuration settings during the migration.
What should the solutions architect do to meet these requirements?

Answer options

• A. Configure the AWS DataSync agent to start replicating the data store to Amazon FSx for Windows File Server. Use the SMB share to host the VMware data store. Use VM Import/Export to move the VMs to Amazon EC2.
• B. Use the VMware vSphere client to export the application as an image in Open Virtualization Format (OVF) format. Create an Amazon S3 bucket to store the image in the destination AWS Region. Create and apply an IAM role for VM Import. Use the AWS CLI to run the EC2 import command.
• C. Configure AWS Storage Gateway for files service to export a Common Internet File System (CIFS) share. Create a backup copy to the shared folder. Sign in to the AWS Management Console and create an AMI from the backup copy. Launch an EC2 instance that is based on the AMI.
• D. Create a managed-instance activation for a hybrid environment in AWS Systems Manager. Download and install Systems Manager Agent on the on-premises VM. Register the VM with Systems Manager to be a managed instance. Use AWS Backup to create a snapshot of the VM and create an AMI. Launch an EC2 instance that is based on the AMI.

Correct answer: B

Explanation

Option B is correct because AWS VM Import/Export enables you to import virtual machine images from your VMware environment to Amazon EC2 as AMIs, which fully preserves the software and configuration. The standard procedure for this is exporting the VM as an OVF template, uploading it to an Amazon S3 bucket, configuring the appropriate IAM service role, and running the import-image command via the AWS CLI. The other options are incorrect because AWS DataSync, AWS Storage Gateway, and AWS Systems Manager are not designed to perform direct VM-to-AMI conversions for VMware virtual disks.