Request for Clarification on Possible Incorrect Answer – Review Mode Set 4 (SAA-

[deepu rs]

Dear Tutorials Dojo Support Team,

I have purchased the AWS Certified Solutions Architect – Associate (SAA-C03) practice exam from Tutorials Dojo.

While going through Review Mode – Set 4, I came across the following question where I believe the provided answer may not be the most appropriate one for the given scenario.

22. Question
Category: CSAA – Design Cost-Optimized Architectures
A company conducts performance testing on a large instance MySQL RDS DB instance twice a week. They use Performance Insights to analyze and fine-tune expensive queries. The company needs to reduce its operational expenses in running the tests without compromising the tests’ integrity.

Which of the following is the most cost-effective solution?

Tutorials Dojo’s answer:

‘Once the testing is completed, take a snapshot of the database and terminate it. Restore the database from the snapshot when necessary.’

My selected answer:

‘Stop the database once the test is done and restart it only when necessary.’

My understanding is that the database instance is used only twice a week. In this scenario, wouldn’t stopping the database after testing and restarting it only when required be the more appropriate solution, since this avoids the need to terminate and restore the database from a snapshot each time?

Could you please review this question and clarify which answer is considered correct and, most importantly, why?

I am currently preparing actively for the SAA-C03 exam and planning to take the exam this month. Small discrepancies like this could potentially lead to incorrect preparation and affect my understanding of the AWS best practices.

I would really appreciate it if you could review this question and provide clarification.

[JR-TutorialsDojo]

Hello deepu rs,

Thank you for sharing your thoughts on this item.

Take note that the question explicitly asks for the most cost‑effective solution. While stopping the database after each test may seem convenient, it does not fully minimize costs and has operational limitations.

Stopping the instance only pauses compute charges, but you continue to pay for provisioned storage (including Provisioned IOPS), backup storage, and any public IPv4 addresses. In addition, an RDS instance can only remain stopped for up to 7 consecutive days, after which it is automatically restarted. This makes it less reliable for recurring twice‑weekly tests.

Taking a snapshot and terminating the instance eliminates both compute and storage costs for the running DB. Snapshots are stored in an Amazon S3 bucket, which is billed at a lower rate than live RDS storage. Restoring from a snapshot recreates the database with the same configuration and data.

Let me know if this helps.

Regards,
JR @ Tutorials Dojo