GCP Professional Cloud Architect Practice Question

A financial-services company is planning a lift-and-shift migration of several on-premises virtual machines that run Microsoft SQL Server Enterprise Edition on Windows Server 2019 Datacenter. Each VM has 8 vCPUs. The company already owns both SQL Server Enterprise core licences and Windows Server Datacenter licences, all covered by active Software Assurance for the next 18 months. Management wants to avoid paying twice for any Microsoft server licences during the migration, while preserving full operating-system-level control of the migrated VMs. Which Google Cloud deployment approach best meets these business and licensing requirements?

Import the existing VMs as custom images and deploy them on Compute Engine sole-tenant nodes, applying the current SQL Server Enterprise and Windows Server Datacenter licences through Microsoft Licence Mobility and BYOL.
Containerise the SQL Server workloads and deploy the containers to Cloud Run using Google Marketplace pay-as-you-go SQL Server images.
Migrate the databases directly into Cloud SQL for SQL Server Enterprise to offload management tasks.
Create new multi-tenant Compute Engine instances from Google-provided SQL Server Enterprise pay-as-you-go images and migrate the databases after cut-over.

Report Issue

Answer Description

Because the company holds active Software Assurance for both SQL Server Enterprise and Windows Server Datacenter, it can use Microsoft's Licence Mobility to apply its existing SQL Server licences on Google Cloud. To reuse the Windows Server licences as well, Microsoft's BYOL program requires that the workloads run on dedicated (sole-tenant) hosts rather than on shared tenancy VMs. Importing the current VMs as custom images and deploying them on Compute Engine sole-tenant nodes lets the company attach its existing SQL Server and Windows Server licences, maintain full OS control, and avoid the additional per-core SQL Server and Windows Server fees that are bundled with Google-provided pay-as-you-go images or incurred when using Cloud SQL or Marketplace container images.

Ask Bash

Bash is our AI bot, trained to help you pass your exam. AI Generated Content may display inaccurate information, always double-check anything important.