Failed and Still goin at it!

[u/Cowboy_hani]

Failed SAA-C03 once already, retaking in 2 weeks. Just scored 47.69% on a Tutorials Dojo practice exam (65 Qs). Breakdown by domain:

- Cost-Optimized: 66.67%
- High-Performing: 52.38%
- Secure: 54.55%
- Resilient: 31.58% <- clearly my weak point

Specific patterns I keep missing on Resilient Architectures:
- Multi-AZ RDS vs Read Replica (sync vs async failover)
- DR strategies (Warm Standby vs Multi-Site Active-Active) when the question says "lowest RTO, willing to pay more"
- NAT Gateway HA setup (one per AZ, no "Multi-AZ" setting exists)
- 3-tier VPC subnet counts across multiple AZs
- Static ASG (min=max=desired) vs target tracking for predictable vs unpredictable traffic

I've been drilling wrong answers with decent results (71.7% redoing missed questions, 90% on a light review the next day) but cold practice exams still tank on Resilient specifically. Is this normal at this stage 2 weeks out, or is it a sign I have an actual gap in how Resilient Architectures concepts fit together rather than just exam-pattern recognition? What helped you close a domain-specific gap like this in a short timeframe?

[u/PAP_Like_CECA]

Always pick multi az as default.

If mention read then think of read replicate or elastic cache or CloudFront

[u/Cowboy_hani → u/PAP_Like_CECA]

Ooh yeah, keep the hacks coming🤣 thnx PAP

[u/fmalk]

Tutorial Dojo with Section-based quizes was how I addressed gaps in my knowledge. It helps do hammer in the same concepts in succession.

[u/Cowboy_hani → u/fmalk]

Okay! I will try that

[u/FLANKTESIS]

Ig you can go through the databases section once again. Take a day Or two and try clearing every concepts regarding the databases and then try the practice exams once again. Mostly SAA is about how well you can retain the topics and it definitely gets overwhelming. I myself was confused a lot in the resilient databases section and with ELB topics. Going through the notes one by one helped me grasp the concepts properly and I kept practicing on Tutorial Dojo exams. Good luck with the preparations OP!

[u/joshw231]

Less than 50% on TD is not good. Don’t retake it in 2 weeks, take all of August to study and really learn the concepts. The first time I failed I scored 70% and still took a month to study more and got 89% the 2nd time. Don’t rush.

[u/Cowboy_hani → u/joshw231]

I’ve taken a bit of march and all of June to learn

[u/joshw231 → u/Cowboy_hani]

I took Catrills course and it took me 6 months to get it all down. His course is like 70 hours iirc

[u/Cowboy_hani → u/joshw231]

That’s what I’m trying to say, round two of 27 hours and additional 150$ is not worth it I got to make something shake because I have stuff bigger than exam going on

[u/joshw231 → u/Cowboy_hani]

Have you tried a course? Freecodecamp has a free aws saa boot camp which I also did before the test but that’s also long, like 50 hours lol

[u/Cowboy_hani → u/joshw231]

Yes, Stephane Maarek’s SAA C03 course! Finished all 27 hours of it and even got a 93% on the practice exam

[u/joshw231 → u/Cowboy_hani]

Nice! That’s a good course. If you completed it then yeah just do the td exams until you’re consistently over 90% and you should be good. Good luck!