Creating a Home network for Labbing help/advice

Came across this website last week and already picked up some cracking tips and help. I read alot how invaluably doing lab work, so you get a feel of what your doing as well as just reading, which makes perfect sense ! So I have a few 2008 R2 VM's setup but i want to have a setup at home which resembles maybe a working enviroment. So here's what i want to do:

3 or 4 servers on a local IP,
Server01 on 10.0.0.10
Server02 on 10.1.0.11
Server03 on 10.2.0.12

Couple of windows 7 clients working off the servers so i can use WSUS, GPO etc.

I can make one a DC, i.e. contoso.com and connect the other two servers to it. But where i'm struggling is getting the servers on different subnets to talk to each other. I did try and play with RRAS but just got frustrated ! I have an HP Pro 250 G5 with 16gb memory at home, so is it worth setting up VLAN's ? Got myself in a right muddle over all this, please help !

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Saundie

I personally use WANem as a router when I am working on labs that require multiple subnets. It aims to emulate a WAN connection (hence the name), and allows you to adjust various parameters such as bandwidth, latency and jitter, which is helpful for simulating slow links. I run my labs in a virtual environment on a couple of physical hosts, so I don't run WANem on a physical system. There's no reason why you couldn't do so, if you so wish. I have the VMs running on their own VLAN so that I can run DHCP etc without it interfering with my home network.

I do have one question, however; why do you have these servers on different subnets? Does the lab scenario actually require it? If you're working from and MS Press book, they usually give you specific instructions on how to go about setting up the test lab.

gbeer7

Hi, thanks for your quick reply. I am following the MS press books, but wanted to be clever and have a few subnets and configure them through a server. Am i best just to ignore this and just follow the MS press books ? Wanted to get a feel for everything. I'm concerned the stuff i'm learning on 70-640 book is not going in. Been doing it for 2 months spending a few hours a night. Hoping to lab so much i can do it in my sleep ! Putting pressure on myself to take the exam as soon as. Want to move from a Support role into a Wintel technical area.

Saundie

It's not a bad idea at all, as it'll let you set up different subnets within AD Sites and Services, which will let you see how replication and group policy are affected by site configuration. The downside is the additional complexity it adds to the labs, which can make it tricky to troubleshoot when something doesn't work the way you expect. Are you running all of your labs on physical servers, or are you using virtual machines? It is a bit difficult to tell from your post.

gbeer7

I'm running Virtual machines from my home server. I have ESXI 5 and using VMware to create virtual machines. I have a technet subscription so have access to Server OS. I don't want to over complicate things and get myself confused. How long from start to finish to take the 70-640 exam should it take ?

mjlynden

If it's any help it took me roughly 4 months to get through the MSPress book from start to finish, doing all their labs.
Then a solid 2 weeks of cramming before the exam.

I passed last week with with a 700, so just nipped through.

The labbing is the most important part. Follow the book but try and set up your own scenarios off the top of your head.

Get especially good with AD CS and DNS.

gbeer7

Thanks Mjlynden, really useful to know. Its my first experience of trying to take an exam. Its an area i want to progress into. Stressing myself out that i'm taking to long .... its getting it to stay in my head as well !!

Saundie

I've been studying for it on and off for about a year - the problem I have is that I get discouraged when I fail, and then give up for months at a time, before realising that I need to get on with it. I guess it depends on your level of familiarity with the product; if you've been working with it for years then you'll need far less study time than if it's new to you. Some of the features are quite difficult to get to grips with if you've never seen them in a production environment, which means you may want to lab them multiple times in order to fully understand them.

MeatCatalogue

Saundie wrote: »

I've been studying for it on and off for about a year - the problem I have is that I get discouraged when I fail, and then give up for months at a time, before realising that I need to get on with it. I guess it depends on your level of familiarity with the product; if you've been working with it for years then you'll need far less study time than if it's new to you. Some of the features are quite difficult to get to grips with if you've never seen them in a production environment, which means you may want to lab them multiple times in order to fully understand them.

70-640 is the most difficult MS exam I had taken until the 70-642. People say CCNA is harder but I didn't have any trouble scoring 91% on that. You don't really need professional experience for any IT exam except perhaps Redhat Certified Systems Engineer and maybe CCIE.

When I took the 70-640 I focused on the big exam topics and didn't bother with things like federated services. Yes I reviewed the topic but I didn't spend a ton of time on it. I think the best bet is to look at chunks of the exam and go at it. If I got a case study involving federated services I probably would have failed but I'm not sure there even is one. Mine involved multi site replication, trusts and configuring a RODC. This was over 3 years ago however and in that time I have seen federated servers exactly ZERO times professionally. I'm sure they exist but maybe for every 1000 copies of Windows server 2008 sold, it is used on 1.

Same with server 2012. No point in certifying on this thing when NO one uses it. Yet anyway.

Peterm44

With the 640 exam I found GPO's, DNS and CS to be the biggest exam topics. The Microsoft book and CBT nuggets videos were very helpful for me personally. I agree that FS is a waste of time, very hard to set up in a lab environment with little reward.