Achievement Unlocked – VCP-NV

A little bit after the fact, but last Friday I sat and passed the VCP-NV exam to leave me the VCP-CMA short of a full house of VCPs (and that beta result is pending). Even though I have only had a few weeks getting hands on with NSX in the hands on labs, I think it’s a tribute to how simple the product is to pick up and run with that I found most aspects of it pretty straight forward to pick up and understand.

I went over the ICM course notes which I had and also watched Jason Nash’s excellent Pluralsight videos. Although not everything about the product is covered in these videos, it’s an excellent primer on some networking fundamental refreshers and also the building blocks to NSX and how to deploy them. There are still a couple of areas that I’m not totally sure about (SNAT and DNAT for example, and where to apply these rules) and I also seem to have a bit of a mental block around when MAC addresses change in transit, but I’m sure I’ll get there in the end.

As NSX is still fresh in my mind and we’re hoping to join a VMware Lighthouse program in the UK, I’ve already booked my VCIX-NV exam for early August, which should give me plenty of time to crystallise the problems I’ve had as listed above. I actually enjoy the Advanced exams more than the VCP type exams as it appeals to the way I work and I prefer being hands on with products, rather than answering conceptual questions about the product.

The exam itself is 125 questions over 125 minutes and as usual is very faithful to the blueprint. Even before I’d got to the end I felt confident that I’d done enough to pass even though I’d been probed on some of my problem areas. In the end I passed reasonably comfortably and I look forward to sitting the VCIX in August!