Alan J. Matson's Blog

Took my CCENT this week and passed with an 887/1000 with only 30 minutes into the test. There were a couple of noobish mistakes I made that I realized after moving to the next question but overall not a bad test.

Working on the ICND2 test now which is slated to take on the 11th of July. The CBT videos and Todd Lammle’s Sybex ICND1 book really covered the material quite well. Highly recommended to those wanting to get their CCNA.

written by Alan J. Matson

Finally after a lot of hard work and a miss the first time by 20 points I tackled the Microsoft Windows 7 client exam (70-680) and crushed it with a score of 890pts. This exam was part of my Bachelors Degree requirements for Western Governors University and the only Microsoft Exam I have to take but I plan on completing the MCITP: Server Administrator as well on my own. Next up is the Cisco CCENT Exam.

written by Alan J. Matson

The company I work for, SonicWALL, have been hard on developing the next level of networking products for the virtual business. With more and more businesses going green and virtualizing their infrastructure this is the next logical step. As a support engineer (and geek at heart) I had to setup my own virtual environment to “play” with the virtual appliances and move my live servers for Active Directory and testing to a central VM Infrastructure.

I started out building a white box ESXi server using spare parts I had laying around. Unfortunately I did have to splurge on a NIC card to get me started but once I was installed I was able to add support for the integrated Realtek 8111C NIC on the motherboard. The list of components for the server are:

• CPU: AMD Phenom II X4 965
• Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-MA785GMT-UD2H
• Memory: 8GB DDR3 1333MHz (4 x 2GB modules)
• Hard Drive: 2TB Western Digital Green Drive
• NIC: Intel Pro 1000GT PCI, Onboard Realtek 8111C

With the base system installed I needed to alter the ESXi install for the Realtek card. I followed the instructions here but for simple sake I am mirroring the files and steps below:

1. Download oem.tgz and put it on a USB stick.
2. Download slax iso image from here and burn a CD.
3. Boot slax CD in ESXi machine – HDD will auto mount, USB will automount.
4. Copy (drag and drop) oem.tgz from USB stick into Hypervisor1 partition on HDD.
5. Shutdown slax and reboot ESXi from HDD – it will automatically load the r8169.

Now I have two fully functioning NIC cards. Currently they are set for teaming/failover but if needed I can take the Intel NIC out to install in another ESXi server if needed

With everything configured I am off to test the VM Appliances and my new virtual Domain Controller

written by Alan J. Matson

Well I am back writing for TalkAndroid.com again after they did some restructuring. TalkAndroid is the most comprehensive site for Android based news and reviews. Give them a visit and see what makes them so great.

TalkAndroid.com

written by Alan J. Matson

I had an awesome interview with SonicWALL yesterday. The seem like such an awesome company to work for that takes pride in their products and service. Keeping my fingers crossed

written by Alan J. Matson

Welcome to my little blog. Since I do tweet and I use Facebook for contacts and business I wanted a place to put my thoughts, projects and daily info up. If you like my topics please feel free to comment and follow my syndication from this site.

written by Alan J. Matson