The 5 Traps in the AZ-104 That Catch Everyone (Including Me)

Scored 745 on the AZ-104 my first time. That's a pass — barely. The passing score is 700, so I squeaked through with zero room to spare.

Second person in my study group scored 680. Failed. Same course, same study materials, similar backgrounds.

The difference? I got lucky on questions he got wrong. And those questions all fell into the same 5 trap categories.

Trap #1: The Case Study Time Sink

The AZ-104 has a case study section at the end. Here's the trap: many people run out of time before reaching the case study.

Budget your time: 50-55 questions in about 70 minutes. Save 30+ minutes for the case study. The exam is 120 minutes total.

Trap #2: NSG vs ASG vs Firewall Confusion

Quick cheat sheet:

• NSG: Layer 4 filtering. Attached to subnets or NICs. Stateful.
• ASG: Logical grouping of VMs. Used INSIDE NSG rules.
• Azure Firewall: Centralized, managed, Layer 7 capable. FQDN filtering.

The "most cost-effective" answer usually points to NSGs. The "enterprise-grade" answer points to Azure Firewall.

Trap #3: Storage Account Redundancy Alphabet Soup

• LRS: 3 copies in one datacenter. Cheapest.
• ZRS: 3 copies across 3 zones in one region.
• GRS: LRS + async replication to secondary region.
• RA-GRS: GRS + read access to secondary region.
• GZRS: ZRS + async replication to secondary.
• RA-GZRS: GZRS + read access to secondary.

Trap question: "needs read access during regional outage" → RA-GRS or RA-GZRS.

Trap #4: RBAC Scope Inheritance

RBAC is additive. Higher-scope permissions are NOT restricted by lower-scope assignments.

Trap #5: "Which PowerShell/CLI Command" Questions

Know the difference between New-Az* (create) and Set-Az* (modify). New-AzVM creates a VM. New-AzVMConfig creates a configuration object only.

How to Avoid All Five

1. Take timed practice exams. ExamCert's AZ-104 practice tests have exam-realistic timing.
2. Build a lab with Azure free tier.
3. Study John Savill's AZ-104 Master Class on YouTube.
4. Focus on the "why" behind each service.
5. Don't skip the case study prep.

Start with a free Azure AZ-104 practice exam on ExamCert — $4.99 lifetime, money-back guarantee.