CompTIA Cloud Essentials+ (CLO-002)Management and Technical OperationsEasy
A cloud operations team is tasked with ensuring high availability for an application that processes real-time financial transactions. The application is deployed across multiple virtual machines in a single cloud region. To mitigate the risk of a single data center outage, they need to distribute these VMs across physically isolated locations within that region. Which concept describes these isolated locations?
- AEdge Locations
- BVirtual Private Clouds (VPCs)
- CAvailability Zones (AZs)
- DCloud Regions
Show answer & explanationAnswer & explanation
Correct answer: C. Availability Zones (AZs)
Availability Zones (AZs) are distinct, isolated locations within a single cloud region. They are designed to be independent of each other, providing fault isolation for power, cooling, and networking, thus mitigating the impact of a single data center failure.
Why the other options are wrong
- A. Edge Locations are typically used for content delivery networks (CDNs) or low-latency services, not for distributing core application VMs within a region.
- B. VPCs are logically isolated networks within a region, but they don't inherently provide physical isolation across different data centers.
- D. Cloud Regions are geographically separate areas, whereas the question specifies 'within that region'.
Availability Zone (AZ)
A physically distinct, isolated location within a cloud region, designed to be independent of other AZs in terms of power, cooling, and networking, for high availability.
- Provides fault isolation within a region.
- Connected by low-latency links.
- Deploying across multiple AZs enhances application availability.
Memory trick: AZs are the building blocks of regional resilience.