Passed VCP410

Just passed the VCP410 exam. I'm not particularly familiar with FC and have never configured an "enterprise" SAN, so those questions gave me the most trouble. Otherwise it was pretty straight forward.

Since VMware is now all about clouds I really think they should call their certification the mile high club.

Resources Used:
VMware Course
VMware Documentation
VCP4 vSphere Study Notes - The SLOG – SimonLong/Blog
Mastering VMware vSphere 4

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JDMurray

kalebksp wrote: »

Since VMware is now all about clouds I really think they should call their certification the mile high club.

And they should describe network conditions using meteorological terms: "Boy, the network is sure a cumulonimbus today!"

msteinhilber

Congrats!

I may be shooting for this shortly depending on how things develop at work. We had been using Hyper-V but I've started to push for vSphere 4 after reading about the essentials package which would work well for us since we wouldn't have the need/budget for anything beyond that.

Picked up the Mastering VMWare vSphere 4 book today, and I asked the nice ladies in our print shop if they would be able to print and punch 3 ring holes on the VMWare documentation so I have that printed up as well (I'm not a PDF reader except for reference).

Only questionable item is the class, nowhere near the room in my budget for that currently and it may or may not be covered by corporate.

kalebksp

Thanks!

msteinhilber wrote: »

I may be shooting for this shortly depending on how things develop at work. We had been using Hyper-V but I've started to push for vSphere 4 after reading about the essentials package which would work well for us since we wouldn't have the need/budget for anything beyond that.

Picked up the Mastering VMWare vSphere 4 book today, and I asked the nice ladies in our print shop if they would be able to print and punch 3 ring holes on the VMWare documentation so I have that printed up as well (I'm not a PDF reader except for reference).

Only questionable item is the class, nowhere near the room in my budget for that currently and it may or may not be covered by corporate.

I've never worked with Hyper-V, I'm curious what features it's missing that makes you want to switch to vSphere. The Mastering vSphere book is excellent, lots of good practical advice, although much of it will be about features unavailable with the essentials license.

I didn't think I was going to get to do this certification due to the class requirement. I saw a posting for local class at a discount one day, figured I may as well try, and next thing you know my employer registered me. It was very lucky that it was local because they certainly wouldn't have paid for out of state travel, and these types of classes rarely come up to Alaska. Maybe you'll get lucky too! If not I think the experience of designing and setting up your own environment will be very valuable to any future employers. Personally I wouldn't pay $3k of my own money for the class, not a big enough return on investment in my opinion. Good luck with whatever you end up doing!

msteinhilber

kalebksp wrote: »

I've never worked with Hyper-V, I'm curious what features it's missing that makes you want to switch to vSphere. The Mastering vSphere book is excellent, lots of good practical advice, although much of it will be about features unavailable with the essentials license.

Two main reasons, the first is we are considering Linux solutions more given our limited budget in current economic times (we are a real estate firm, pinching pennies) and Hyper-V has more limitations and pitfalls with Linux compared to VMware. The other reason is marketability as an individual with VMware experience vs. Hyper-V experience. My boss and I are not very satisfied with our current employment and better marketability with solid VMware experience would only benefit us. Don't intend to sound very selfish with that comment, but I would be lying if I said it didn't contribute to the push to VMware over Hyper-V.

jibbajabba

msteinhilber wrote: »

Congrats!

I may be shooting for this shortly depending on how things develop at work. We had been using Hyper-V but I've started to push for vSphere 4 after reading about the essentials package which would work well for us since we wouldn't have the need/budget for anything beyond that.

Picked up the Mastering VMWare vSphere 4 book today, and I asked the nice ladies in our print shop if they would be able to print and punch 3 ring holes on the VMWare documentation so I have that printed up as well (I'm not a PDF reader except for reference).

Only questionable item is the class, nowhere near the room in my budget for that currently and it may or may not be covered by corporate.

Trying to get this done for flippin ages now (printing PDF and get them bound) but no local shop is able to do so .. or for some silly price / page.

I am just glad that I did the class myself last year so if I am able to pass 410 until December 31 I won't have to do it again

bwcarty

Congrats....thanks for reminding me that I still need to upgrade my VCP from VI:3 to vSphere.

Starke

No one ever seems to consider Citrix XenServer. XenServer is a really good product and is free, you only have to pay if you want advanced monitoring, HA or advanced features with a SAN. You still get the motion technology for free. Linux VMs also work very well on Xen and they offer a number of prebuilt ones.

I am consultant and I use all three with my customers. I tend to like to use HyperV for SBS or a customer that has a less skilled IT, VMware if I have to pass through SCSI and XenServer for everything else. I find that Citrix XenServer is my preferred solution to manage with. I think VMware still has an edge with some of the advanced SAN technologies but XenServer is catching up.

msteinhilber wrote: »

Congrats!

I may be shooting for this shortly depending on how things develop at work. We had been using Hyper-V but I've started to push for vSphere 4 after reading about the essentials package which would work well for us since we wouldn't have the need/budget for anything beyond that.

Picked up the Mastering VMWare vSphere 4 book today, and I asked the nice ladies in our print shop if they would be able to print and punch 3 ring holes on the VMWare documentation so I have that printed up as well (I'm not a PDF reader except for reference).

Only questionable item is the class, nowhere near the room in my budget for that currently and it may or may not be covered by corporate.

Starke

Congrats kalebksp, I need my company to fork out the dough for this one.

mzgavc

kalebksp wrote: »

J
VMware Course
VMware Documentation
VCP4 vSphere Study Notes - The SLOG – SimonLong/Blog
Mastering VMware vSphere 4

Hey just some clarification... the VMware Course, is this the 3.5 Install and Config course or is it the vSphere 4 course?

Also, how did you find the Mastering VMware vSphere 4 book? Was it relevant to the exam, or did you find the information difficult to sift through.

Congrats on your pass!

And they should describe network conditions using meteorological terms: "Boy, the network is sure a cumulonimbus today!"

Even after we added an extra vSwitch, I'd say the stratus of network contention has been foggy.

kalebksp

mzgavc wrote: »

Hey just some clarification... the VMware Course, is this the 3.5 Install and Config course or is it the vSphere 4 course?

Also, how did you find the Mastering VMware vSphere 4 book? Was it relevant to the exam, or did you find the information difficult to sift through.

I took the vSphere 4 ICM course. Mastering VMware vSphere 4 is very good, but it is definitely not aimed at certification, it's more real world. I found the VMware documentation to be the best source of certification material. Of course hands on with the products is also very important.

kalebksp

Starke wrote: »

No one ever seems to consider Citrix XenServer. XenServer is a really good product and is free, you only have to pay if you want advanced monitoring, HA or advanced features with a SAN. You still get the motion technology for free. Linux VMs also work very well on Xen and they offer a number of prebuilt ones.

I am consultant and I use all three with my customers. I tend to like to use HyperV for SBS or a customer that has a less skilled IT, VMware if I have to pass through SCSI and XenServer for everything else. I find that Citrix XenServer is my preferred solution to manage with. I think VMware still has an edge with some of the advanced SAN technologies but XenServer is catching up.

I've been considering doing some certifications for Hyper-V and XenServer to give myself a more well rounded view of the enterprise virtualization world, but I'm way too busy at the moment. Unless I'm mistaken only VMware supports things like FT, SRM, and 3rd party virtual switches, which I think are major features for large enterprises. For companies needing more basic virtualization XenServer looks very interesting.

Starke

The company that wrote the HA for Citrix XenServer is called Marathon Technologies. They offer a third party solution which is very cost effective that is like VMware FT, it offers full lock step of the CPU process to cause zero downtime, a number of airlines use this product to ensure that. Marathon also offers another solution similar to SRM. I don't know about the third party virtual switches. In the small to medium market I still prefer Citrix.

kalebksp wrote: »

I've been considering doing some certifications for Hyper-V and XenServer to give myself a more well rounded view of the enterprise virtualization world, but I'm way too busy at the moment. Unless I'm mistaken only VMware supports things like FT, SRM, and 3rd party virtual switches, which I think are major features for large enterprises. For companies needing more basic virtualization XenServer looks very interesting.

kalebksp

Starke wrote: »

The company that wrote the HA for Citrix XenServer is called Marathon Technologies. They offer a third party solution which is very cost effective that is like VMware FT, it offers full lock step of the CPU process to cause zero downtime, a number of airlines use this product to ensure that. Marathon also offers another solution similar to SRM. I don't know about the third party virtual switches. In the small to medium market I still prefer Citrix.

That's very cool, I'll have to look into XenServer more. Provided the XenServer can do all it claims would agree that it sounds like a great fit for small and medium businesses.