AWS RDS Multi-AZ DB Instance

RDS Multi-AZ Instance Deployment

RDS Multi-AZ DB Instance Deployment

  • RDS automatically creates a primary DB Instance and synchronously replicates the data to a standby instance in a different AZ.
  • RDS performs an automatic failover to the standby, so that database operations can be resumed as soon as the failover is complete.
  • RDS Multi-AZ deployment maintains the same endpoint for the DB Instance after a failover, so the application can resume database operation without the need for manual administrative intervention.
  • Multi-AZ is a High Availability feature and NOT a scaling solution for read-only scenarios; a standby replica can’t be used to serve read traffic. To service read-only traffic, use a Read Replica.
  • Multi-AZ deployments for Oracle, PostgreSQL, MySQL, and MariaDB DB instances use Amazon technology, while SQL Server DB instances use SQL Server Mirroring.

RDS Multi-AZ Instance Deployment

  • In a Multi-AZ deployment,
    • RDS automatically provisions and maintains a synchronous standby replica in a different Availability Zone.
    • Copies of data are stored in different AZs for greater levels of data durability.
    • Primary DB instance is synchronously replicated across Availability Zones to a standby replica to provide
      • data redundancy,
      • eliminate I/O freezes during snapshots and backups
      • and minimize latency spikes during system backups.
    • DB instances may have increased write and commit latency compared to a Single AZ deployment, due to the synchronous data replication
    • Transaction success is returned only if the commit is successful both on the primary and the standby DB
    • There might be a change in latency if the deployment fails over to the standby replica, although AWS is engineered with low-latency network connectivity between Availability Zones.
  • When using the BYOL licensing model, a license for both the primary instance and the standby replica is required
  • For production workloads, it is recommended to use Multi-AZ deployment with Provisioned IOPS and DB instance classes (m1.large and larger), optimized for Provisioned IOPS for fast, consistent performance.
  • When Single-AZ deployment is modified to a Multi-AZ deployment (for engines other than SQL Server or Amazon Aurora)
    • RDS takes a snapshot of the primary DB instance from the deployment and restores the snapshot into another Availability Zone.
    • RDS then sets up synchronous replication between the primary DB instance and the new instance.
    • This avoids downtime during conversion from Single AZ to Multi-AZ.
  • An existing Single AZ instance can be converted into a Multi-AZ instance by modifying the DB instance without any downtime.

RDS Multi-AZ Failover Process

  • In the event of a planned or unplanned outage of the DB instance,
    • RDS automatically switches to a standby replica in another AZ, if enabled for Multi-AZ.
    • The time taken for the failover to complete depends on the database activity and other conditions at the time the primary DB instance became unavailable.
    • Failover times are typically 60-120 secs. However, large transactions or a lengthy recovery process can increase failover time.
    • Failover mechanism automatically changes the DNS record of the DB instance to point to the standby DB instance.
    • Multi-AZ switch is seamless to the applications as there is no change in the endpoint URLs but just needs to re-establish any existing connections to the DB instance.
  • RDS handles failover automatically so that database operations can be resumed as quickly as possible without administrative intervention.
  • Primary DB instance switches over automatically to the standby replica if any of the following conditions occur:
    • Primary Availability Zone outage
    • Loss of network connectivity to primary
    • Primary DB instance fails
    • DB instance’s server type is changed
    • Operating system of the DB instance is undergoing software patching
    • Compute unit failure on the primary
    • Storage failure on the primary
    • A manual failover of the DB instance was initiated using Reboot with failover (also referred to as Forced Failover)
  • If the Multi-AZ DB instance has failed over, can be determined by
    • DB event subscriptions can be set up to notify you via email or SMS that a failover has been initiated.
    • DB events can be viewed via the Amazon RDS console or APIs.
    • The current state of the Multi-AZ deployment can be viewed via the RDS console and APIs.

Multi-AZ DB Instance vs Multi-AZ DB Cluster

RDS Multi-AZ DB Instance vs DB Cluster

AWS Certification Exam Practice Questions

  • Questions are collected from Internet and the answers are marked as per my knowledge and understanding (which might differ with yours).
  • AWS services are updated everyday and both the answers and questions might be outdated soon, so research accordingly.
  • AWS exam questions are not updated to keep up the pace with AWS updates, so even if the underlying feature has changed the question might not be updated
  • Open to further feedback, discussion and correction.

References

RDS_Multi-AZ_DB_Instance_Deployment