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  1. #1
    DF VIP Member gandalf72's Avatar
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    Help Question relating to installing virtual pc's for learning purposes

    Hi All,

    I am looking to get into studying for the MCP in windows 10 and then going for server etc after that. Not much experience in windows 10 and wanted to see if this was possible and if so what would be the best way to deal with it.

    What I would like to do is install a series of virtual PC's that has server 2012/16 then a few client pcs that I can practice install techniques and group policy etc. I know I can download eval versions but wanted to know the best way to set it up if it was possible.

    I will be getting a new system shortly as seen below and going to stick a 3tb SATA drive in as well from an old PC. I was thinking I could maybe store the virtual PC's on the 3tb SATA. Just never really set something up like this and not sure how to deal with the time issue of these virtual PC's i.e. having to wipe when the eval time period runs out and then re-install. Any advice would be appreciated.

    Also, your opinions on the PC spec below would also be appreciated. I am not sure that it may be cool enough? Thanks in advance folks.
    LN73237 be quiet! Dark Base PRO 900, Silver, Full Tower Computer Chassis, E-ATX to mITX, with Window, 3x 140mm Silent Wings Fans £209.99


    LN69604 Asus ROG MAXIMUS VIII EXTREME/ASSEMBLY, Intel Z170, S1151, DDR4, SATAe, U.2, M.2, SLi/CrossFire, acWiFi, USB3.1A+C, EATX £481.99


    LN65564 Intel Core i7 6700K, S 1151, Skylake, Quad Core, 4.0GHz, 4.2GHz Turbo, 8MB Cache, 1150MHz GPU, 40x Ratio, 91W CPU Retail £299.00


    LN69098 Corsair Hydro Series H115i All-In-One Extreme Performance CPU Cooler with 280mm Radiator, 2x 140mm Fans, for Intel/AMD £124.99


    LN42238 1000W Seasonic SS-1000XP Platinum Full Modular, 80PLUS Platinum DC-DC 120mm SanAce Silent Fan, ATX, PSU £169.99


    LN67618 512GB Samsung 950 PRO, M.2 (22x80) PCIe 3.0 (x4) NVMe 1.1 SSD, UBX, 3D V-NAND, Read 2500MB/s, Write 1500MB/s, 300k IOPS £263.94


    LN55618 Pioneer BDR-209EBK Blu-ray Writer Quad Layer 16x BD-R, x8 DVD±DL x16 DVD±R Up to 128GB Retail £58.00


    LN73247 Zotac GeForce GTX 1080 AMP Extreme Edition 8GB GDDR5X 2560 Core VR Ready Graphics Card with LED Lighting £695.99


    LN73402 2* 32GB (2x16GB) Corsair DDR4 Vengeance LED, PC4-24000 (3000), Non-ECC Unbuffered, CAS 15-17-17-35, White LED, XMP 2, 1.35V £351.55


    Total £2675.41 (Inc VAT)
    Last edited by gandalf72; 9th July 2016 at 08:26 PM.

  2. #2
    DF Super Moderator piggzy's Avatar
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    Default Re: Question relating to installing virtual pc's for learning purposes

    I use Windows 10 and have VMWare running with a number of different things. Linux, other Windows etc.
    All runs well.

    Spec looks good and 32gb RAM is a good choice when using VM. I tried Oracle VirtualWorkstation or whatever they call it but it wasnt for me. Had a number of issues.

    Roughly same spec machine I have and zero issues with VM's. Oh wait, Only issue is with some Linux VM's depending on what spec you want to run require you to disable Hyper-V (which you easily re-enable after)

    2 Thanks given to piggzy

    gandalf72 (9th July 2016),  Over Carl (9th July 2016)  


  3. #3
    DF VIP Member gandalf72's Avatar
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    Default Re: Question relating to installing virtual pc's for learning purposes

    Thanks for the above, will vmware allow me to reset the operating systems once the evals run out or do I have to rebuild entire virtual pcs again?

  4. #4
    DF VIP Member Over Carl's Avatar
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    Default Re: Question relating to installing virtual pc's for learning purposes

    If you are using evaluation copies rather than licensed copies, you will have to rebuild them again when the time limit runs out.

    Couple of thoughts on your build:

    Having the VM's all on one SATA drive may not be fun. If you try and boot them all at the same time, things could be painfully slow until disk I/O calms down.

    Just a thought - instead of the SSD you mentioned, you can get 512GB 850 EVO SATA version for around £110, or I think you can get 1Tb 850 EVO SATA for around the price you mentioned.

    May be an idea to stick the boot volumes for your VM's on SSD so they will be a lot quicker to work with, and maybe use the HDD for low I/O type work.

    2 Thanks given to Over Carl

    gandalf72 (9th July 2016),  piggzy (9th July 2016)  


  5. #5
    DF VIP Member gandalf72's Avatar
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    Default Re: Question relating to installing virtual pc's for learning purposes

    Thanks for the above I reallly appreciate that advice, would I be better to get one of those pci adapters that lets you stack m2 drives and put the 2 drives onto that ? Or is that not possible?

    What I mean is if I have the 950 for windows 10 operating system and then say put the 1tb drive you suggested as a backup for the vms ? Would it be possible to set up the eval products for each of the pc's and then I am not sure if I am saying this right take an image of all vm's and then lets say for example I only used the eval period for 10 days for the windows 10 study but then it was months before I then started to be in a position to do the server put the image back on without it impacting the main operating system?

    Thanks in advance

  6. #6
    DF VIP Member Over Carl's Avatar
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    Default Re: Question relating to installing virtual pc's for learning purposes

    M2 for OS and 1tb SATA SSD for VM's should be a nice and fast system. Shouldn't need any fancy adapters to plug these in. You still may want to also add that HDD you mentioned for low usage tasks.

    Unfortunately the time limits for evaluation purposes may be a real headache for you. When I was in a similar position, I got a load of codes from someone's TechNet account so my VM's were all "properly" licensed.

    Thanks to Over Carl

    gandalf72 (9th July 2016)  


  7. #7
    DF VIP Member gandalf72's Avatar
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    Default Re: Question relating to installing virtual pc's for learning purposes

    Really appreciate your help, thank you. I am not lucky enough to be in the position to have those proper codes just not really sure best way forward in the situation lol.

  8. #8
    DF Super Moderator piggzy's Avatar
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    Default Re: Question relating to installing virtual pc's for learning purposes

    For M$ operating systems I used the usual Toolkits/Activators and had no issues whatsoever ;-)

    Not sure if this would work but could you Install one, use activation method of your choosing. Set clock forward 30 days to see if all is well ??

    Thanks to piggzy

    gandalf72 (10th July 2016)  


  9. #9
    DF VIP Member gandalf72's Avatar
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    Default Re: Question relating to installing virtual pc's for learning purposes

    Guys am I right in thinking that I would put my main operating system windows 10 on the 950. I would then have to create a new operating system, for the ssd sata drive 1tb that then gets all the vm pcs set up on it in a dual boot but I have to wipe it if I go down the legit mode every 28 days. If I have to wipe it every 28 days I would create a image of the 1tb ssd and keep that on the 3tb drive?

  10. #10
    DF VIP Member Sanj[UK]'s Avatar
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    Default Re: Question relating to installing virtual pc's for learning purposes

    Quote Originally Posted by gandalf72 View Post
    Guys am I right in thinking that I would put my main operating system windows 10 on the 950. I would then have to create a new operating system, for the ssd sata drive 1tb that then gets all the vm pcs set up on it in a dual boot but I have to wipe it if I go down the legit mode every 28 days. If I have to wipe it every 28 days I would create a image of the 1tb ssd and keep that on the 3tb drive?
    No dual booting.

    My setup is a server running server 2012 r2 (The trial lasts for 180 days) and then I run Hyper V for all my training VM's (7/10/Server r2 2012 x 2 for DC's). You can re-arm the server r2 trials (instructions - http://www.howtogeek.com/109141/how-...l-to-240-days/)

    2 Thanks given to Sanj[UK]

    gandalf72 (15th July 2016),  Over Carl (15th July 2016)  


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