Friday 4 June 2021

The 3 steps to becoming a VCP-DCV 2021

 

The VMware Certified Professional – Data Centre Virtualisation 2021

I won’t lie the last 16 months have been some of the busiest that I’ve known whilst working for QA, and I’m certainly not complaining, I’ve taught 100% virtual courses and this has meant lots of time at home, before lockdown I would spend over 26 weeks away from home per year.

The only downside was that I haven’t been able to sit any exams, just too busy, and I’m working on my work/life balance. I did become a Mental Health First Aider during lockdown and finding you time is also important, that may mean study, just not for me.

Now things are calming down, it’s time to get back on the certification trail and I’m starting with the VMware Certified Professional – Data Centre Virtualisation 2021 exam number VMware vSphere 7.x (2V0-21.20)

Where to Start

There are 3 steps to becoming certified.

1)    Recommended, gain experience with VMware vSphere 7, you will be expected to know how to perform various tasks.

2)    Required, sit on a qualifying VMware course, I’ll mention my three preferred later in this post.

3)    Required, pass the exam, delivered by Pearson Vue testing.

To gain experience can be done in a number of ways.

·         You could play with your work kit, however the rest of the IT department may get a bit upset with this.

·         Build a test lab, I use VMware workstation and create VMs within the product. It works really well.

·         Use VMware Hands on Labs, I also visit this quite a bit, there’s lots of labs covering all aspects of vSphere.

The three courses I would recommend.

·         VMware vSphere: Install, Configure, Manage [V7]

·         VMware vSphere: Fast Track [V7]

·         VMware vSphere: Optimize and Scale [V7] – We don’t run this course that often as it is an advanced course and most people will pick one of the other two, but if you want it, we’ll run it.

 

 

No course can possibly cover all aspects of the product in 5 days, so I’d also recommend looking at the exam guide and if you’re up to it read all the associated documents mentioned, especially the network, storage, security, high availability, and resource management guides.

 

Now the important bit

Pass the exam.

The exam consists of 70 multiple choice questions, and you have 130 minutes, the exam is delivered via Pearson VUE and can be sat either in a Pearson VUE testing centre or can be done as a remotely monitored (proctored) exam from home.

300 is a pass, don’t think of a percentage or how many do I need to get right, that’s not the way it works.

I’ve sat many VMware exams, actually over 20 so far, and if you’ve put the work in, they’re extremely passible, I would recommend, answering all the questions you’re 100% sure of, mark the others, and return back to them, if you run out of time you fail, so try to remove that stress by not sitting for 10 minutes trying to think of an answer.

Finally best wishes for the exam, I never wish good luck, we make our own luck, if you’ve done the work you’ll pass.