AWS DevOps Engineer Professional Practice Test

What operating system setting is a best practice to enable the best network throughput on EC2 instances?

1. Reducing the latency setting

2. Increasing the MTU

3. Optimizing the CPU settings

4. Disabling IPv6

The correct answer is: Increasing the MTU

Increasing the Maximum Transmission Unit (MTU) is considered a best practice for enhancing network throughput on EC2 instances. MTU refers to the size of the largest packet that can be sent over a network. When the MTU is optimized, the amount of data sent in a single packet is maximized, which reduces the overhead associated with packet headers and can lead to more efficient data transmission. By having a larger MTU, more data can be transmitted in fewer packets, thereby reducing the frequency of packet processing and improving overall throughput. This is particularly important for applications that rely heavily on data transfer efficiency, as it can significantly enhance performance. It’s essential to ensure that the MTU settings are consistent across the network path to avoid fragmentation, which can negate the benefits of a larger MTU. In contrast, other options such as reducing latency settings, optimizing CPU settings, and disabling IPv6 may impact network performance but are not directly tied to achieving the best network throughput in the same way that adjusting MTU does. Reducing latency could improve responsiveness, while CPU optimization may enhance processing capabilities, but neither directly addresses the efficiency of network data transmission as effectively as optimizing MTU. Disabling IPv6 is not generally a solution for improving throughput since IPv6 can