One way to get your act together and go getting your "VCAP" ...

jibbajabba

... I made my manager making this my objective for Q2 next year ..

Roll on Blue Print

gorebrush

Objectives are a great way of getting motivated...

I had an objective of "passing one exam" this year.

I passed CCNA: Security in January
Then passed CCNP Firewall in March
CCIE Written in August.

Not bad

QHalo

good luck sir.

blargoe

That's one way to do it. Good luck!

Essendon

You'll pass just fine jibba, I reckon. Remember to -

- Not overlook anything in the blueprint, and I mean anything. Everything from AutoDeploy and host profiles to claimrules to FT to scheduled tasks is fair game.

- Be quick during the test. If you cannot do a task for whatever reason, eff it and move on to the next one.

- I had a task on the my exam that I couldnt finish because of a VM's component. I just couldnt get it to complete, so I thought - eff this, I'll just delete that component and finish off the task. So I deleted that component and was able to finish the task. But what I didnt know is that an entire question (down the order) depended on that component! Yikes! I couldnt add that component back, it just wouldnt let me! I missed some easy points. Later I realized why the first task wouldnt complete and I didnt really need to delete the component. So just something to keep in mind.

- Do not wait for an installation to finish. Say if your setting up AutoDeploy and have kicked off the install, dont twiddle your thumbs waiting for it to finish. Pick another task and do that while the previous one finishes.

- I'll repeat this - BE QUICK!

About7Narwhal

How do you guys train for exams like these? They aren't like the low level Windows certs where you can roll a hand full of clients and learn that way. Is the test more on theory than experience or what?

Essendon

These advanced exams really test the depth of your knowledge. This knowledge can be gained by experience or extensive labbing. For me it was extensive labbing and about 2 years of experience with vSphere (most of it was just working on VM's). So for the DCD - really extensive reading and some labbing. For the DCA - really extensive labbing and a fair bit of reading. And yes, you need a few hosts and shared storage and the everything else that's needed. I highly recommend everyone working on vSphere on a daily basis to achieve the DCA at least. One, you stand out from the competition on the resume. Two, you learn a lot and become more confident of your skills.

About7Narwhal

I had planned on toying with some VM stuff because we use it at work but our analysts don't really seem to know what is going on with it. They inherited the project from someone who left and it has been unstable at best. Good incentive with the 50% off vouchers posted in another thread.

I'm not sure yet though, I keep changing from one idea to another; cannot seem to find a technology to stick with after my MCTS.

Essendon

Do it. You cant go wrong with learning and understanding virtualization, even if you dont work on it every day.