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Difficulty: MediumResilience, High Availability, and Redundancy

An e-commerce platform requires local disk storage resilience for its transaction database host. The requirement states that if a single physical drive experiences a total hardware failure, the database must remain fully operational without service disruption or data loss while the failed hardware is replaced. Which of the following resilience controls best satisfies this requirement?

  1. A RAID 5 array configured with hot-swappable drivesAnswer
  2. B
    Daily automated disk snapshots copied to an off-site cloud repository
  3. C
    A cold disaster recovery facility maintained for manual server rebuilds
  4. D
    Dual power supply units connected to independent power distribution feeds

Answer

A RAID 5 array configured with hot-swappable drives
Configuring a RAID 5 array with hot-swappable drives provides disk-level fault tolerance through distributed parity. If a single drive fails, data remains immediately accessible without system downtime, and hot-swappable hardware allows drive replacement while the system remains fully online.

Step-by-Step Solution

1
Identify the primary operational constraint and failure domain
The requirement specifies real-time local storage fault tolerance to survive a single drive hardware failure without downtime or data loss.
Distinguishing drive failure from electrical power loss or site disasters isolates storage-level high availability as the target domain.
2
Evaluate candidate storage fault-tolerance mechanisms
RAID 5 distributes parity across multiple drives so data can be dynamically reconstructed on-the-fly during a single drive crash.
Hot-swappable drive bays permit physical disk replacement without shutting down the operational host.
3
Differentiate fault tolerance controls from backup and power controls
Daily snapshots and cold sites involve recovery downtime, while dual power supplies resolve power grid failures rather than drive failures.
Selecting RAID 5 with hot-swappable drives uniquely satisfies all scenario requirements.

Key Concept

Disk Fault Tolerance and RAID Storage Resilience
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Topics

Resilience, High Availability, and Redundancy

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