VCP5 Exam

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NetJunkie

[H]F Junkie
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Mar 16, 2001
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I scheduled this exam like two months ago and kept rescheduling it..I think I literally did it 7 times due to other things come up and no time to prep. We have an engineer meeting on Monday and I wanted to talk to the guys about the exam so I just went and took it cold today without any prep. Thankfully I passed. :) Glad to get that out of the way.

It's a good test. Better than VCP3 and VCP4 for asking real world applicable info. Know your Ent+ features SIOC, NIOC, vDS, etc.
 
Thanks for the input on the test. I'll be taking it after my EMC exam mostly likely mid-December.
 
85 questions and 90 minutes. I don't think it's harder..just more real-worldy.
 
Sorry to bring this one back from the dead. I have to take this thing in the next week or two... got it scheduled. We will see how it goes.

I feel like I really know the product from vSphere 4, but I do question myself on stuff I probably will never use much. VSA? vDR? That stuff is so small-shop (no offense). I'm just never going to use it in a production environment. Same goes for iSCSI. I use it in my lab. I have so much real world experience that I wonder how much of it I will know from my "over time" use of vSphere 4. NetJunkie... this might apply to you more. I use this stuff everyday, especially enterprise plus features... NIOC, SIOC... etc. I have definitely reviewed and played with the differences in 5.0. LLDP, NetFlow, etc. Just curious how much of the exam overall played from your past experience?

I will have completely read all the vSphere 5 documentation in the next few days. I'm most of the way through it now. Its so dry reading stuff that is the same as it was. Only certain things have changed and some of the documentation is wrong in places. I pick up stuff I'd never thought.. like scheduled tasks only validating the permissions at the time the job was created... lol. Add that one to my checkup list when people leave :>.
 
I'm in the same boat, mine is scheduled for the 29th...lol.
 
Vader said:
I'm in the same boat, mine is scheduled for the 29th...lol.
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I'd move it up to at least the 21st. You have a 7 day wait period, once that is up you can take it again. I'll be floored if I fail given that I got such a high score on my VCP4. I've been using 5 in a lab environment testing everything out, so if a lot of the 'real world' stuff doesn't carry over very well... I guess I will know after the exam. I'll have another shot on the 29th if I have to bite the bullet and take it twice.
 
My experience with the certification is that you need to be at least familiar with the 'small' shop technologies.

I would also recommend giving yourself an opportunity for a second attempt if you can. It took myself and a well versed co-worker two attempts to finally get it (hurts missing by only a few points that first time around). I had a working knowledge of enterprise technologies used day to day and got broadsided by the less common protocols.

Mastering VMWare vSphere 5 is great supplementation to the VMWare dry documents. Clustering deep dive was also a good reference.
 
Taking mine on Friday. The other 3 consultants at my company all passed it on the first try so I'm hoping I don't break that trend. :)
 
Yeah..I read Mastering vSphere 4 and i'm about 1/2 way through Mastering vSphere 5 right now. I did really well on the VCP4 as well and i'm going in with much more experience with our enterprise environment than I had with the VCP4 so i'm sure i'll do alright. At work, i'm running 4.1 U1, 10 hosts, etc, and home, 5.

On another note, are they offering the "second chance" again? I'll probably reschedule for the 21'st if they do.
 
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My ICM 5.0 course wraps up tomorrow. I'm half way through the 5.0 clustering deepdive but haven't started Mastering yet. I'm planning to study for about a month and then take the test, you can try again if you fail right?
 
That's what i'm trying to find out. When I took my VCP4, they were offering a "second chance," didn't need it but it would be nice to have..especially when the deadline is looming for us that don't want to pay for the course.
 
You can retake after 7 days. There was no 'second chance' offer when I failed my first attempt, I had to pay full price for the second attempt - this was Oct 2011.
 
Yeah, Pearsonvue was running a special in August for the free retake on a failed test. It was only one month if I remember. By the time I took my VCP4 in September it had expired. My wife is really pushing me to take thee VCP5 test before the deadline, but I haven't even looked at the new version or started on any documentation yet.. so I'm afraid it would just be tossing money down the hole...
 
In case anyone didn't know: If you already taken the VCP 4 class, passed the VCP 4 exam, you have until the end of this month to take VCP 5, without having to take any additional courses. After that, you would have to subscribed to one of their paid courses.
 
I scheduled my test for the 21st and now I'm stressing. I still have my study notes from my 4.1 exam in December, but I just haven't had the time to really hit the new version changes. Any advice on what to really focus on for the next two days?
 
Child of Wonder said:
Passed mine on Friday.

Looking forward to taking the VCAP-DCA then DCD next.
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You waiting on the 5.0 version of the DCA? I was trying to prepare for it, but decided not to do that at the same time I was getting ready for the VCP5. Pretty nervous about the exam, gotta take it today ;). If I fail I'm going to be floored.
 
defuseme2k said:
You waiting on the 5.0 version of the DCA? I was trying to prepare for it, but decided not to do that at the same time I was getting ready for the VCP5. Pretty nervous about the exam, gotta take it today ;). If I fail I'm going to be floored.
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Yeah, I was planning on taking the VCAP4 but figured I might as well wait until 5.0 comes out.

I found the VCP5 a little easier than I expected but that's only because I've been neck deep in VMware as a consultant since I took the VCP4 over 2 years ago. The VCP4 felt harder because I was less experienced at the time.
 
I have signed up for the ICM class that is offered at the local community college. It starts in May so I am hoping to take the exam after the class is finished which is early August I believe. Trying to squeeze this cert in while I prepare for the CCIE R&S cert.
 
I passed on my second try about a month ago. The class depending on the instructor may or may not help a lot in prep for the test. Plan on spending a good chunk of time on a lab if you don't work with it everyday as that's what got me over the hump my second try. I've done some light virtualization for about 4 years now but have never been the primary vSphere admin, so my hands on was very minimal just so you know.
 
Just signed up for a class to qualify for the VCP5 exam. I'll probably take my test sometime in the next couple weeks (before my class).. I guess it'll become official after I finish my course. :)

Just waiting for the VCAP5-DCA to become available so I can take that as well.

FYI - Good alternative to the 5 day class is the VMWare Academy offering.
http://www.cccti.edu/vmware/

Class starts on 2/27 for me and runs through 3/29 at only $1000 instead of the $3500 from VMWare.
 
Be a while on the VCAP5-DCA. It hasn't even gone beta yet. The DCD is in beta right now.
 
NetJunkie said:
Be a while on the VCAP5-DCA. It hasn't even gone beta yet. The DCD is in beta right now.
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Yeah, that's the part that sucks. I don't know whether I want to go and get the VCAP4-DCA or not. I probably could pass it, but frankly I wouldn't have the balls to try it without lots of prep first.
 
My ICM course finished last week, I took the online version direct from VMware since I couldn't find anything cheaper near me. The instructor was really good. Gonna study for at least 4 weeks and then take the exam by the end of March.
 
Talk about last minute..I passed the VCP5 today! Did much better on this than VCP4 as finally they are starting to test real world scenarios..etc. Much better than memorizing random facts.
 
Vader said:
Talk about last minute..I passed the VCP5 today! Did much better on this than VCP4 as finally they are starting to test real world scenarios..etc. Much better than memorizing random facts.
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Congrats! I enjoyed it too, I think its great that it is so much more real world. It was pretty refreshing. I bet the VCAP exams are like that too, I need to just fork over the 400$ and just go take it... either I will get owned and realize I don't know as much as I think I do OR it'll just be shit I do a lot normally. I know they'll throw in command line crap and high speed vCenter config work, but that is all OK by me ;).
 
I got a buddy here at work whos taking the DCD or DCA today and hes gonna let me know about his study notes and wether he passed or not so if u want i can hook u up if you are looking. Might be able to at least get some focus on the more indepth things they have, i just cant remember which one hes taking.
 
dasaint said:
I got a buddy here at work whos taking the DCD or DCA today and hes gonna let me know about his study notes and wether he passed or not so if u want i can hook u up if you are looking. Might be able to at least get some focus on the more indepth things they have, i just cant remember which one hes taking.
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How was the VCP5-DT - I think from your sig you have that? I am taking my course at CCCTI right now so I qualify to take the VCP5 (been using vmware esx/workstation for a lonng time so that shouldn't be a problem) but I haven't worked with View much so looking for some pointers.

Going to setup a lab environment here at home to mess with (have some Wyse thin clients, etc) to test but curious about how the test is.
 
Yea i got my VCP-DT, i am very View proficient, there were a lot of quesions about the specific types of pools when creating, and more interface type questions, also knowing the GPOs.

Check out Error 28014 and SSLBind KBs from vmwares site.

Know how to use a transfer server and its limits.

Stuff like that will help you out immensly with the test, also take the mock exam but keep in mind not everything is 100% accurate on that.. i pointed it out to my buddies the other day.
 
dasaint said:
I got a buddy here at work whos taking the DCD or DCA today and hes gonna let me know about his study notes and wether he passed or not so if u want i can hook u up if you are looking. Might be able to at least get some focus on the more indepth things they have, i just cant remember which one hes taking.
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Yeah, that would be cool man. For now, I'm only interested in the DCA, but the DCD is an obvious secondary want.
 
He wasnt in today but i will find out that info and pass along the study stuff... i did hear you should definatly be proficient with the vMA, Creating DV Switches, Private vLaning (Modes), Powershell commands (although not too much on this) etc.

ill keep ya in the loop
 
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