What should a solutions architect recommend as replacement database?

By:
In: SAA-C02
Tagged:
With: 1 Comment
A company running an on-premises application is migrating the application to AWS to increase its elasticity and availability.The current architecture uses aMicrosoft SQL Server database with heavy read activity.The company wants to explore alternate database options and migrate database engines, if needed.Every 4 hours, the development team does a full copy of the production database to populate a test database.During this period, users experience latency.

What should a solutions architect recommend as replacement database?

Use Amazon Aurora with Multi-AZ Aurora Replicas and restore from mysqldump for the test database.

Use Amazon Aurora with Multi-AZ Aurora Replicas and restore snapshots from Amazon RDS for the test database.

Use Amazon RDS for MySQL with a Multi-AZ deployment and read replicas, and use the standby instance for the test database.

Use Amazon RDS for SQL Server with a Multi-AZ deployment and read replicas, and restore snapshots from RDS for the test database.

Explanations:

Amazon Aurora does not support Microsoft SQL Server, so this option is not applicable for migrating from a SQL Server database.

Aurora does not support SQL Server. Even though Aurora with Multi-AZ is an option, the use of RDS snapshots is not suitable as a replacement for SQL Server.

Amazon RDS for MySQL is not an ideal replacement for Microsoft SQL Server as it might require significant changes to the application. Additionally, using the standby instance for the test database isn’t the best practice, as the standby instance is intended for failover.

Amazon RDS for SQL Server with Multi-AZ deployment and read replicas provides the best option for migrating from SQL Server to AWS, offering high availability and elasticity, while also using snapshots to restore the test database without impacting production.

2025-10-14

1 Comment

  1. Nicole
    Author

    I have a feeling that the answer is:
    Use Amazon RDS for SQL Server with a Multi-AZ deployment and read replicas, and restore snapshots from RDS for the test database.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

one × three =