A financial services firm runs a latency-sensitive relational database on a single EC2 instance. The database sustains roughly 60,000 IOPS during peak trading hours and requires consistent single-digit millisecond latency, and the storage layer must offer the highest EBS volume durability available because the data is mission critical. A solutions architect must choose the EBS volume type that meets the sustained IOPS, low latency, and durability requirements. Which volume type should be selected?
- AProvisioned IOPS SSD (io2), provisioning 60,000 IOPS to deliver consistent low latency with the highest durability among EBS volume types. Correct
- BGeneral Purpose SSD (gp3), provisioning its maximum throughput so the sustained 60,000 IOPS demand is met during the peak trading window.
- CThroughput Optimised HDD (st1), sized large enough that its throughput baseline supports the database IOPS and latency targets during peaks.
- DCold HDD (sc1), since its lower cost per gigabyte makes it the most economical way to provision the IOPS the trading database requires.
Why A is correct: io2 supports the high provisioned IOPS and consistent low latency the database needs and offers the highest EBS volume durability, matching every stated requirement.
Why B is wrong: A single gp3 volume tops out at 16,000 provisioned IOPS, well below the sustained 60,000 IOPS the trading database needs, so it cannot meet the requirement.
Why C is wrong: st1 is a magnetic volume tuned for large sequential throughput, not the small random reads and writes of a database, so it cannot deliver consistent single-digit millisecond latency.
Why D is wrong: sc1 is the lowest-cost, lowest-performance HDD intended for infrequently accessed data, so it falls far short of 60,000 IOPS and low-latency transactional access.