MCSA from home

Hi -

I am an MCP and an MCDST and about to attempt the 3 topics/exams to make me an MCSA. This time though, i plan on self-studying. I am going to do this via the self-paced training packs and possibly videos. Therefore, to do the practical work - will i need to network 2 or 3 PCs and install Active Directory on an allocated server?

Is there any other hardware/software i would need?

thanks

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meadIT

You can just install Virtual PC or VMWare on your PC and set up all your labs with virtualization. There's really no need to buy extra PC's.

Clarky321

That sounds to good to be true!

Ive never used virtual machine before - so im not sure how i would be able to emulate a server (with AD) and 2 clients at the same time. Probably because im not thinking lateral and trying to conceive this in my mind is confusing!

ilcram19-2

Clarky321 wrote: »

That sounds to good to be true!

Ive never used virtual machine before - so im not sure how i would be able to emulate a server (with AD) and 2 clients at the same time. Probably because im not thinking lateral and trying to conceive this in my mind is confusing!

thats all i been using i have about 1dc 2exchange 2003 in a cluster with a Virtual SAN 2 sql2005 servers 1exchange 2007 server 2 2008 servers it made everything easier for my mcse and messaging stuff now im using for sql stuff it works perfect i have 1 amd dual core with 2gb of ram and a quadcore with 8gb of ram to run al those vms, i stared out with virtual pc, then vmware server, the virtual server 2005 then vmware exsi then hyper-v then virtial machine manager 2008 now im just using vmware exsi and vmware server 2.0 they seem to support a lil more operating systems than microsoft stuff and so for cisco router emulation gns3 is awsome

rwwest7

Clarky321 wrote: »

That sounds to good to be true!

Ive never used virtual machine before - so im not sure how i would be able to emulate a server (with AD) and 2 clients at the same time. Probably because im not thinking lateral and trying to conceive this in my mind is confusing!

Plus, not only will you learning AD, you'll learn VMWare also. VMWare is quickly becoming a desired knowledge with employers.

tornado42

Clarky321 wrote: »

That sounds to good to be true!

Ive never used virtual machine before - so im not sure how i would be able to emulate a server (with AD) and 2 clients at the same time. Probably because im not thinking lateral and trying to conceive this in my mind is confusing!

it totally works. its not too hard either. i installed vmware 1.(something) on a windows 2000 machine. I had 1 windows 2003 server loaded inside the vmware and one windows xp also... then i also had my laptop join and log on to the 2003 server and made all the AD changes. I worked fairly well. 2000 machine that was running the vmware was pretty much useless when running 2003 and xp at the same time but that was because of the age of the computer.

Clarky321

I think im ready to try this out now. Hopefully I have this right:-

I install vm software onto my xp home desktop
Within the vm - i install my trial version of win server 2003 (which includes AD)
I then install xp two or three times, in the vm - as clients to the server

- Therefore I don't loose my existing operating system (which is xp home) as it is a real install and anything else is running virtually. Do I have this right?

thanks.

djhss68

I think so.

I am going to use VMware ESXi. Haven't done it yet, I'm waiting for parts.

Can I use all trial software? I want to use Server 2008 and XP Pro so I'm not sure if I would be able to intall multiple instances of trial XP Pro and be able to network those virtually with 2008.

aquageek

Clarky321 wrote: »

I think im ready to try this out now. Hopefully I have this right:-

I install vm software onto my xp home desktop
Within the vm - i install my trial version of win server 2003 (which includes AD)
I then install xp two or three times, in the vm - as clients to the server

- Therefore I don't loose my existing operating system (which is xp home) as it is a real install and anything else is running virtually. Do I have this right?

thanks.

Yep, sounds right. Check to make sure you're using the correct version of VMWare - I believe it's VMware Workstation - for use on your desktop pc.

Also, I believe the MSPress self-paced training book requires you to have two (virtual) computers running server 2003 - one as DC and one as a member server.