NCP-AII Practice Questions: Troubleshooting and Optimization Domain
Test your NCP-AII knowledge with 10 practice questions from the Troubleshooting and Optimization domain. Includes detailed explanations and answers.
NCP-AII Practice Questions
Master the Troubleshooting and Optimization Domain
Test your knowledge in the Troubleshooting and Optimization domain with these 10 practice questions. Each question is designed to help you prepare for the NCP-AII certification exam with detailed explanations to reinforce your learning.
Question 1
After updating the CUDA toolkit, a deep learning model's training time has increased. What should you investigate first?
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Correct Answer: undefined
Explanation: Changes in CUDA kernel configurations or optimizations in the new toolkit version could affect performance. Investigating these changes is crucial before considering reversion or other optimizations. Increasing batch size or optimizing preprocessing might help but doesn't address toolkit-specific issues.
Question 2
An InfiniBand network is experiencing unexpected latency. Which tool would you use to diagnose and verify the configuration of the InfiniBand fabric?
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Correct Answer: undefined
Explanation: ibdiagnet is a comprehensive diagnostic tool for InfiniBand fabrics, capable of verifying configurations and detecting issues such as incorrect routing or connectivity problems. Option A provides basic status information. Option B is used for simple connectivity tests. Option C provides link information but lacks diagnostic capabilities.
Question 3
During a routine check of your NVIDIA DGX server, you notice that the GPU utilization is consistently below expected levels despite high CPU workloads. Which of the following could be a primary cause?
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Correct Answer: undefined
Explanation: A CPU-GPU data transfer bottleneck can occur if the PCIe bandwidth is saturated, preventing efficient data transfer to the GPUs. This would result in low GPU utilization despite high CPU workloads. Option A is incorrect because insufficient power typically leads to system instability or shutdowns, not low utilization. Option C is unlikely as an incorrect CUDA version would typically cause compatibility issues rather than performance degradation. Option D is incorrect because faulty hardware would usually present more severe symptoms like errors or crashes.
Question 4
A new AI workload on your NVIDIA GPU server is not performing as expected, and nvidia-smi shows low GPU utilization. What is a likely cause and solution?
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Correct Answer: undefined
Explanation: Low GPU utilization with a CPU-bound workload indicates that the code needs optimization for parallel execution. Options A and B do not directly address the workload characteristics, and Option D is unlikely to resolve a CPU-bound issue.
Question 5
While monitoring a GPU server, you notice that the GPU memory is underutilized. Which nvidia-smi command would help identify the processes consuming the most GPU memory?
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Correct Answer: undefined
Explanation: The command nvidia-smi --query-compute-apps=pid,used_memory --format=csv provides detailed information about the processes using GPU memory, helping identify which applications are consuming the most. Option B queries memory temperature, not usage. Option C provides power draw data. Option D is related to MIG, not general memory usage.
Question 6
You are experiencing high latency in your InfiniBand network used for AI workloads. What is the most effective way to diagnose the cause of this latency?
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Correct Answer: undefined
Explanation: RDMA (Remote Direct Memory Access) configuration issues can cause high latency in InfiniBand networks. Ensuring correct RDMA setup is crucial for low-latency performance. Increasing MTU size (B) could help with throughput but not latency. Re-cabling (C) is unlikely to solve configuration-related latency. Upgrading firmware (D) is useful for bug fixes and improvements but should be considered after configuration checks.
Question 7
You are configuring an InfiniBand network for a high-performance computing cluster. Which factor is most critical for optimizing bandwidth utilization?
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Correct Answer: undefined
Explanation: Quality of Service (QoS) settings are crucial for managing and optimizing bandwidth utilization in an InfiniBand network, as they allow prioritization of traffic. While having the latest hardware (A) and redundancy (D) are beneficial, QoS directly affects bandwidth efficiency. Cable length uniformity (C) is less critical in this context.
Question 8
An AI model deployed on a GPU cluster is underperforming. Which step is most effective for identifying if the issue is due to network bandwidth limitations?
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Correct Answer: undefined
Explanation: Using iperf to monitor network traffic is the most effective way to identify bandwidth limitations, which could be causing underperformance. Option A checks GPU utilization but not network issues. Option C checks CPU load, unrelated to network bandwidth. Option D checks disk I/O, also unrelated to network performance.
Question 9
You are tasked with optimizing CUDA kernel performance. Which of the following strategies is most effective for improving memory coalescing?
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Correct Answer: undefined
Explanation: Aligning data structures to 128-byte boundaries helps optimize memory coalescing by ensuring memory accesses are contiguous and aligned, reducing the number of memory transactions. Option A can lead to register spilling, which is not related to coalescing. Option C is effective for reducing access latency but not directly for coalescing. Option D does not affect memory coalescing directly.
Question 10
During a performance analysis, you find that the data transfer between GPUs over NVLink is slower than expected. What is the first step you should take to troubleshoot this issue?
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Correct Answer: undefined
Explanation: Option C is correct because ensuring NVLink is enabled and configured correctly in the BIOS is foundational for its operation. Option A is premature without confirming configuration issues. Option B is not the first step as configuration issues are more common. Option D is unrelated as RAM does not directly affect NVLink data transfer speeds.
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About NCP-AII Certification
The NCP-AII certification validates your expertise in troubleshooting and optimization and other critical domains. Our comprehensive practice questions are carefully crafted to mirror the actual exam experience and help you identify knowledge gaps before test day.