Lab Setup

jacksonr

Hi Guys,

just wanted some advice.
I have a AD Server setup using VMware and 2 clients. 1 Windows 7, and 1 Windows Vista all joined to the same domain.

Should that be enough for the Lab requirements? i5, 32GB of RAM and a 500GB HDD.

Cheers

VikingWarlord

I was about to ask the same thing for 70-680/685/686. I just got a used Ebay server (dual Xeon 2.5, 16GB RAM, 500GB HDD) running 2008 R2 and stood up Hyper-V running four VMs. One is a 2008 R2 DC, the other 3 are Win7 clients so I can practice imaging and deployment. I can't imagine this wouldn't be good enough but I'm just kind of guessing based on the exam objectives.

jacksonr

Bump!!!

JeanM

It really depends on what you are trying to LAB.... some labs are as simple as one DC + client.... some are more involved with multiple servers.

IIS, WSUS, SQL, Exchange, then you add SCCM and multiple servers... I would imagine whatever you are trying to study/lab would have a requirement list that you can follow as blueprint to create a lab.

jacksonr

Thanks Jean, I am setting up a Lab for the 70-680. I have had a look through the recommendations from the Official MS Press Book and I think that will be enough. Just wondered if someone could clarify?

RaoulC

I have only just started my labbing for the 70-680, and I have setup a similar environment using Virtualbox, one DC with AD DS and at this point 4 clients 2 running Windows 7, one running Vista, and one running XP.


I would think that what you have setup should be fine you can always add an extra client if necessary along the way, your hardware can certainly accommodate it.

As JeanM said it would really depend how far you want to take things. I also have access to a paid for virtual training environment through my work and for the labs that you can do related to the 70-680 it typically uses just a DC and 2 client PC's.

jacksonr

Lovely, thanks Raoul.
Good Luck.

Jon_Cisco

I am thinking of setting up a virtual environment just to become familiar with Active directory. It seems like I would want to add exchange to that also just to get some familiarity with them. I am currently studying for a Associates in Computer Science and so this is not really exam focused.

Can I get away with using virtual box and 8gb of ram to run several servers at once for testing? I know the question is a bit vague but I figure others here have probably tried it and hae a good idea if it can work for basic testing.

Thanks for any feedback.
Jon

stryder144

One way that it was explained to me on how to figure out how many VMs you can run goes something like this:


1. Use the recommended minimum RAM to run the desktop Windows OS (Windows 7, for instance, requires 2GB for 64bit version).


2. Install and run VirtualBox, then use Task Manager to show you how much RAM it is using without a VM running.


3. Add the results of 1 and 2 together and that gives you the amount you should protect when calculating how much RAM is available for VMs (for instance, 2GB + 1GB - 8GB = 5GB left for VMs).


4. Depending on the OS and services that you plan to run on each VM, that will dictate how much RAM each of your VMs will need. Minus those numbers from the 5GB in our example above. So, if one VM requires 2GB and the second one requires 3GB, you will be left with only 2 VMs that you can run.


So, the more RAM you have and/or the smaller VM RAM requirement, the more VMs that can be comfortably run at one time. For those with more experience, please feel free to correct me. I've only ever really run desktop OSes in VMs, so I've never had an issue when using this method of calculating how many VMs I could run at one time.

Asif Dasl

@Jon - Server 2012 only needs 512 to 1GB of RAM so using VMware workstation or virtualbox you should be able to run 3 to 4 instances of Server 2012 comfortably - Exchange on the other hand, you won't be able to by the looks of things... check the hardware tab.

Jon_Cisco

Thank you for the responses. I downloaded an ISO for Win7 and Sever2008r2. Looks like I'll be waiting on exchange!

I do hope to build a virtual setup down the road but I'm still in the exploration stage and don't want to commit to much till I am ready to take advantage of it.