Can't wait to start back into Microsoft Certs!

Ertaz

I think the MCSE 2016 will be my 2018 cert goal. Anyone else?

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DatabaseHead

Do it!

I'd like to do an Azure certification, but it's just not in the cards.

malachi1612

Yep same for me, I start studying for 70-740 in September. Hopefully this time next year I should be taking my 70-742 exam or have my MCSA in Server 2016.

kaiju

740 and 742 are not that difficult but many people are having issues with 741.

malachi1612

Yep, looks like 70-741 is the new 70-411 on the cert difficulty scale.

alan2308

I'm planning to do the 70-743 at some point this year. I don't do a lot with Windows Server/Active Directory any more, but not keeping my MCSA current feels a lot like letting a cert lapse and I just don't want to do that.

Ertaz

Well, I've bought all the MCSA books. Should be here next week.

JoJoCal19

I will probably do a read through of the 740 materials to stay up on things in the Windows world.

alan2308 wrote: »

I'm planning to do the 70-743 at some point this year. I don't do a lot with Windows Server/Active Directory any more, but not keeping my MCSA current feels a lot like letting a cert lapse and I just don't want to do that.

Good idea. I always feel it's better to have a current cert that's in demand just in case one finds their self needing to find work.

Ertaz

JoJoCal19 wrote: »

I will probably do a read through of the 740 materials to stay up on things in the Windows world.

Good idea. I always feel it's better to have a current cert that's in demand just in case one finds their self needing to find work.

Yep. I live in a rural area with no high end IT demand. After reflection, I suppose I'm going to get this MCSE and then focus on the CCNP security in the spring. Then if things ever go south, I can go anywhere with multifaceted ninja skills. The second shot vouchers are pretty handy to know you've got an extra one in the bag.

Ertaz

So I now have access to licensed versions of the software through the imagine program. Time to start building VMs and labbing.

*EDIT: First VM is built. Now to figure out if I need a nicer desktop to host all these VMs.

alan2308

VMs are primarily about RAM and storage. As long as you can add more of those as needed, you probably don't need a whole new desktop.

Ertaz

alan2308 wrote: »

VMs are primarily about RAM and storage. As long as you can add more of those as needed, you probably don't need a whole new desktop.

This is probably what I'll use. Intel S2600CP2J Motherboard Dual E5-2670 SR0KX 64GB Package Deal

64Gb/16C32T should get me started.

Ertaz

Ended up buying 128Gb/16C32T. Should be here in a week or so.

djrabes

I bought a Dell PowerEdge R300 off eBay a few months ago to help me with my Server 2012 exams. Now I'm onto 2016, it doesn't support SLAT so can't install 2016 Hyper-V on it, so using 2012 as Host. Has an Xeon quad and 24GB RAM, 2x250GB HDDs, paid £59 with free delivery for it

How many VMs are you running?

malachi1612

Im running an AMD 8320 with 16gb RAM and 2 HDD's in raid 0. Server 2016 as the host with Server 2012, 2016 and Win 10 VM runs great on it.

AMD FX CPU's can be had for cheap now with the release of Ryzen. They maybe slow for gaming now compared to newer CPU's but they are a beast of VM's due to the amount of cores.

Ertaz

djrabes wrote: »

I bought a Dell PowerEdge R300 off eBay a few months ago to help me with my Server 2012 exams. Now I'm onto 2016, it doesn't support SLAT so can't install 2016 Hyper-V on it, so using 2012 as Host. Has an Xeon quad and 24GB RAM, 2x250GB HDDs, paid £59 with free delivery for it

How many VMs are you running?

I'll probably run no more than 10. I want flexibility if I decide to go after the OSCP in the spring.

Panther

Ertaz wrote: »

So I now have access to licensed versions of the software through the imagine program. Time to start building VMs and labbing.

*EDIT: First VM is built. Now to figure out if I need a nicer desktop to host all these VMs.

Can you help an unemployed fellow techie out. What's the imagine program? Thank you.

Panther

Are you running you server as full gui, or just command line/hypervisor? Then running other VMs on top of that? I'm just starting to get back into home server lab. Dabbled a bit with hypervisor many years ago. Figured it'd give me a bit of real world experience.

poolmanjim

Panther wrote: »

Are you running you server as full gui, or just command line/hypervisor? Then running other VMs on top of that? I'm just starting to get back into home server lab. Dabbled a bit with hypervisor many years ago. Figured it'd give me a bit of real world experience.

The way I setup my lab is with 2 Hyper-V hosts running Server Core with the Hyper-V feature installed. Everything else is hosted off those two servers, with one exception. Due to Server Core being a bit tricky to get going the first time, I have a spare box that I have 2016 full GUI installed on that is used as an initial management box to get my first 2-3 VMs running (DCs and at least 1 Management Server). Other than those everything is virtual.

Ertaz

Panther wrote: »

Can you help an unemployed fellow techie out. What's the imagine program? Thank you.

My son is a college student. He gets access to free software through https://imagine.microsoft.com/en-us

Hawk321

Checked the curriculum of the 70-741...jez, Microsoft dares to ask for BGP and SDN ??? Ask a Cisco Guy (CCNP and up) what he thinks about it.
Oh and xVLAN....who implements vlans on a server, when the admin has a cisco switch ??? IPAM need a M$ SQL Server ???

I never understood why M$ put so many exotic topics in their exams. Deep DNS, DHCP etc. knowledge is ok...but the rest ? Looks like some obscure marketing to me.

djrabes

Hawk321 wrote: »

Checked the curriculum of the 70-741...jez, Microsoft dares to ask for BGP and SDN ??? Ask a Cisco Guy (CCNP and up) what he thinks about it.
Oh and xVLAN....who implements vlans on a server, when the admin has a cisco switch ??? IPAM need a M$ SQL Server ???

I never understood why M$ put so many exotic topics in their exams. Deep DNS, DHCP etc. knowledge is ok...but the rest ? Looks like some obscure marketing to me.

IPAM doesn't need an SQL server, you could always use WID (Windows Internal Database) but for productions you will mostly use SQL aha

malachi1612

malachi1612 wrote: »

Yep same for me, I start studying for 70-740 in September. Hopefully this time next year I should be taking my 70-742 exam or have my MCSA in Server 2016.

Took my 70-740 today and passed first time round

and it was NOT easy. So the journey officially begins...

Next 70-741 hopefully before Christmas.