1 Course Introduction • Introductions and course logistics • Course objectives 2 vSphere and Virtualization Overview • Explain basic virtualization concepts • Describe how vSphere fits in the software-defined data center and the cloud infrastructure • Recognize the user interfaces for accessing vSphere • Explain how vSphere interacts with CPUs, memory, networks, storage, and GPUs 3 Installing and Configuring ESXi • Install an ESXi host • Recognize ESXi user account best practices • Configure the ESXi host settings using the DCUI and VMware Host Client 4 Deploying and Configuring vCenter • Recognize ESXi hosts communication with vCenter • Deploy vCenter Server Appliance • Configure vCenter settings • Use the vSphere Client to add and manage license keys • Create and organize vCenter inventory objects • Recognize the rules for applying vCenter permissions • View vCenter logs and events 5 Configuring vSphere Networking • Configure and view standard switch configurations • Configure and view distributed switch configurations • Recognize the difference between standard switches and distributed switches • Explain how to set networking policies on standard and distributed switches 6 Configuring vSphere Storage • Recognize vSphere storage technologies • Identify types of vSphere datastores • Describe Fibre Channel components and addressing • Describe iSCSI components and addressing • Configure iSCSI storage on ESXi • Create and manage VMFS datastores • Configure and manage NFS datastores 7 Deploying Virtual Machines • Create and provision VMs • Explain the importance of VMware Tools • Identify the files that make up a VM • Recognize the components of a VM • Navigate the vSphere Client and examine VM settings and options • Modify VMs by dynamically increasing resources • Create VM templates and deploy VMs from them • Clone VMs • Create customization specifications for guest operating systems • Create local, published, and subscribed content libraries • Deploy VMs from content libraries • Manage multiple versions of VM templates in content libraries 8 Managing Virtual Machines • Recognize the types of VM migrations that you can perform within a vCenter instance and across vCenter instances • Migrate VMs using vSphere vMotion • Describe the role of Enhanced vMotion Compatibility in migrations • Migrate VMs using vSphere Storage vMotion • Take a snapshot of a VM • Manage, consolidate, and delete snapshots • Describe CPU and memory concepts in relation to a virtualized environment • Describe how VMs compete for resources • Define CPU and memory shares, reservations, and limits 9 Deploying and Configuring vSphere Clusters • Create a vSphere cluster enabled for vSphere DRS and vSphere HA • View information about a vSphere cluster Explain how vSphere DRS determines VM placement on hosts in the cluster • Recognize use cases for vSphere DRS settings • Monitor a vSphere DRS cluster • Describe how vSphere HA responds to various types of failures • Identify options for configuring network redundancy in a vSphere HA cluster • Recognize vSphere HA design considerations • Recognize the use cases for various vSphere HA settings • Configure a vSphere HA cluster • Recognize when to use vSphere Fault Tolerance 10 Managing the vSphere Lifecycle • Enable vSphere Lifecycle Manager in a vSphere cluster • Describe features of the vCenter Update Planner • Run vCenter upgrade prechecks and interoperability reports • Recognize features of VMware vSphere® Lifecycle ManagerTM • Distinguish between managing hosts using baselines and managing hosts using images • Describe how to update hosts using baselines • Describe ESXi images • Validate ESXi host compliance against a cluster image and update ESXi hosts • Update ESXi hosts using vSphere Lifecycle Manager • Describe vSphere Lifecycle Manager automatic recommendations • Use vSphere Lifecycle Manager to upgrade VMware Tools and VM hardware