Beginner looking to start a home lab.

[Rwalker90]

Hi guys,

Looking for some advise.

Recently built a new machine

I7 4770k

8gb ram

120 gb ssd

1tb hdd

Z87 mobo

I am wanting to build a home lab to get ready to hopefully do a vcp 5 and overall get more involved in my role as a junior solutions architect, however can't really afford all the physical components for a home lab nor do I have the space until I can get out of my parents place into my own.

So I am wanting to set up a Homelab in a virtual environment. As I am a beginner to this, I have basic experiment with VMware. I can use fusion on my mac to run windows and server 2012 but only for the experience to see what fusion was like. I want to be able to use workstation, vsphere etc (enterprise products). Does anyone have any advise with starting my own virtual lab?

Any help will be greatly appreciated

Thanks

Rwalker90

[a_p_]

Welcome to the Community,

VMware makes it easy to build a virtual lab for studying. Take a look at e.g. Building the Ultimate vSphere Lab for how this can be done. From your system specifications, only the memory seems to be a bit low. I'm running a virtual lab too and usually almost max out the 16GB I currently have.

André

[Rwalker90]

Thanks André

I thought the ram might have been a limitation, just waiting for the next pay day then will be upgrading that. Thanks for you help. The link looks like a great read.