Analyze server configurations and optimize performance settings before considering hardware upgrades Upon observing increased response times during peak activity in load testing, the appropriate initial action is to analyze and optimize server configurations and performance settings. This approach involves reviewing settings such as cache, parallelism, and other performance-related configurations that could impact response times, offering a potentially more cost-effective solution than immediate hardware upgrades. Option A is incorrect because adding hard-ware resources should be considered only after ensuring that the server configurations are fully optimized. Option C is incorrect as reducing the number of concurrent users may not address the underlyingperformance issues and could negatively impact user experience. Option D is incorrect be-cause ignoring the results can lead to ongoing performance issues, adversely affecting user satisfaction and server reliability.