How much can I earn working with Netapp technology?

by Learn Storage

One thing that’s always asked – or at the back of your mind before you begin learning a technology – is what sort of salary can be achieved when fully qualified?

Well, I get emails every day with potential job opportunities, and here are just some of the roles and their salaries:

Flexpod/Vblock Pre/Post Sales Consultant £50,000-65,000 + Car + Bonus Homebased- Reseller
Flexpod/Vblock Pre/Post Sales Consultant £55,000-70,000 + Car + Bonus Homebased- Vendor
Flexpod/Vblock Pre/ Sales Consultant £50,000-65,000 + Car + Bonus London- Reseller
Flexpod/Vblock Pre/Post Sales Consultant £55,000-65,000 + Car + Bonus Homebased- Global Reseller
Flexpod/Vblock Pre Sales Consultant £80,000-100,000 + Car + Bonus Homebased- Vendor
Flexpod/Vblock Support Engineer £40,000-50,000 London- Vendor
Flexpod/Vblock Support Engineer £40,000-50,000 Milton Keynes- Global Reseller
Vblock Architect £80,000-100,000 + Car + Bonus London- Vendor
Flexpod Solutions Architect £60,000-70,000 + Car + Bonus London- Reseller
Flexpod Solutions Architect £60,000-70,000 + Car + Bonus London- Reseller

Another one from todays inbox:

I wondered if you were currently looking for opportunities at the moment. I am recruiting for a senior pre-sales opportunity based around storage and virtualisation. The total package is up to £100,000 a year.

And another from yesterday:

You will have technical experience in supporting at least two of the following Vendors

-Dell Equalogic & Compellent (Storage)
-HP P4000 & 3 Par (Storage) / NetApp.
-NetApp
-Hitachi

You will also be qualified with an industry recognised qualification i.e. NCDA, NCIE, DCP, HCP.

You will be home based and travel to client sites in and around the UK (mainly within the South East of the UK, London regions).

Excellent company with superb career and development prospects e.g. time off in lieu for any project work taken.

Salary is up to £55,000 + car allowance + benefits.

So there you go. It’s something I often wondered about before starting down the path to NCDA certification, and something I wish others had shared.

Maybe I shouldn’t have shared this info, maybe it’s confidential, or maybe it’s considered bad form. Honestly, I think you have a right to know whats achievable (in the UK at least) and then you can make a more informed decision on whether to spend a great deal of time learning Netapp.

Remember, you’re always going to earn more in and around London, so take that into consideration.

Posts up North will be closer to £40-50k.

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How To… Install Ontap 8 7-Mode Simulator Video Series – Part 2

by Learn Storage

This is video two in my two part How To video series on installing the Netapp Ontap 8 7-mode series simulator.

In this video we continue installing the first simulator, but crucially also look at how to set up a second simulator in such a way that it will not conflict with your first simulator.

I hope these videos are helpful to you. They are part of an upcoming course I am making on how to use the Simulator to study for your NCDA.

Coming Soon

If you want to know more about my course and be the first to hear when it is released, please consider signing up to my mailing list >>> it’s over the menu bar to your right.

I promise I won’t spam you, sell your email address or abuse your email in any way. I am really picky about what I personally sign up too, and I am sure you are the same. The last thing I would do is treat you differently to how I would expect to be treated.

Anyway, with that said, I really do hope these vids help you. Any questions, comments, feedback or what not, please feel free to leave it here on my videos.

Thanks for watching :) and happy sim’ing!

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How To… Install Ontap 8 7-Mode Simulator Video Series – Part 1

by Learn Storage

This is the first of two videos on how to install the Ontap 8 7-Mode simulator in VMWare.

I had to split this in to two videos because Youtube unfortunately won’t allow me to upload one longer video.

In the first part, I show you how to download the simulator, some additional files you will need to get and look at the differences between Ontap 8 7-mode and the older 7.x.x series simulator.

The next video will be up very shortly.

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All About Netapp Exam NS0-154

by Learn Storage

What do I get when I pass the NCDA exam?

netapp-ncda-pin-badgeYou will receive your exam score. Shortly afterwards, you will recieve a certificate through the post signed by Netapp CEO Tom Georgens, and a nice shiny Netapp pin badge, which is pictured in this post :)

Oh, you also become a Netapp Certified Data Administator! Which looks nice on your CV.

Yes, that is my badge :D

Official Netapp Study Guide

Download Netapp’s NS0-154 official study guide here.

This is a free download from Netapp, but be warned, it is not enough to pass the exam!

This guide is a (very) brief overview of the required topics from the NS0-154 exam, and should not be used solely to study for the exam. There are many topics on the NOW communities forum about how this document is, alone, not sufficient to pass the exam.

However, this study guide does contain references to other helpful documents that you must read and understand to help pass the NCDA exam.

NS0-154 vs NS0-153 and NS0-163

When I sat my NCDA exams, I was forced to do the two exam route – NS0-153 and NS0-163. This was phased out with the release of Data OnTap 8.

The NS0-154 exam is now a single exam of approximately 75 questions.

You should sit the single NS0-154 exam for the following reasons:

  • You save yourself a lot of money by sitting only one exam
  • You only have to travel to the test center once!
  • The NS0-154 exam is the most current exam
  • Your NCDA qualification will last longer and be more relevant

What topics are covered in the Netapp NS0-154 exam?

Keep reading to find out

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7 Helpful Videos For NCDA Preparation

by Learn Storage

Netapp release a lot of free training materials via a number of different channels – primarily the Netapp NOW site, but also through social media such as YouTube.

Here are 7 videos on various Netapp technologies that are worth watching whether you are preparing to sit the NCDA or just interested in furthering your storage knowledge.

The Videos

Learn about NetApp’s storage efficiency technologies from Larry Freeman.

Nearly all storage vendors offer Snapshots, but all Snapshots are not created equal. NetApp wrote the book on Snapshots over a decade ago. Find out why NetApp Snapshots are the standard by which all others are judged.

More after the jump!

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The 11 Best Ways To Get Your First Storage Role

by Learn Storage

Becoming a storage engineer can be difficult. Junior roles are relatively hard to come by, and in a way not too dissimilar to Networking, typically the more junior roles are filled by internal candidates.

So with that in mind, I want to give you some advice and pointers on how to approach becoming a storage engineer. And whilst this advice is primarily talking about the Storage field, remember that you can apply this advice to pretty much any other field in IT.

Check the job boards regularly

Whether you have a full time job, are contracting or are looking for work, you should have a daily routine to check through the big jobs boards for your country.

In the UK, some good jobs boards for IT jobs are:

Reed
CWJobs
The IT Jobs Board
BCS Recruit
Monster

And don’t forget about niche specific jobs boards like:

Jobs Go Public
NHS Jobs

You would definitely be surprised by the amount of high end hardware that the public sector own and use, so never rule them out.

Other great places to look are universities, contractor firms own websites such as IT Works or Badenoch and Clark.

10 more tips for your first storage admin role…

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NAS vs SAN – What’s The Difference?

by Learn Storage

Let’s start with what they mean:

SAN – Storage Area Network

NAS – Network Attached Storage

How Are They The Same?

Both protocols provide other computers with a way to access their (the SAN or NAS) centralised, shared resources.

The centralised, shared storage offered by a SAN or NAS is typical configured to use RAID (Redundant Array of Independent Disks) which simply means that they pool together a number of hard disks, so that if one hard disk fails, the others can continue to operate, so data is not lost.

And How Are They Different?

For a SAN device, the controller provides block-level access to the hosts. The hosts then create and manage their own local file system (for example, NTFS), and this local file system is typically not shared with other hosts.

With a SAN and special Host Bus Adapters (HBA’s), you can connect your server through the network via ISCSI or Fibre Channel even before you have booted to your operating system, and to a specially formatted file called a LUN, which you can then use as your Windows C:\ drive for example, and boot directly from the SAN.

NAS storage uses the file system that the NAS device controls, and multiple other computers then connect to the NAS device and access data at a file level. Think of a NAS device as a typical networked Windows server – you and your colleagues connect to the share path, such as \\server23\it_dept\, but there is no way to place your Windows C:\ drive on that device.

Can One Box Do Both SAN and NAS?

Yes. Though traditionally restricted to the enterprise due to costs, more and more devices available to the performance oriented home user are featuring SAN technology.

The boundaries between SAN and NAS are blurring. Companies like Netapp and EMC offer products that allow the enterprise user a complete range of options on one piece of hardware.

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