Building your own Lab

BUILDING YOUR OWN LAB

In order to gain the best preparation for the F5 201 Certification Exam you will need to get hands on experience working with a BIG-IP® system. Not everyone will have the possibility to configure, maintain and operate a BIG-IP® system and are therefore required to build their own lab environment. This webpage is created to assist the students of the F5 201 Study Guide with obtaining the components necesarry to build their own lab environment. This page will not contain any labs on how to setup the lab environment nor any lab exercises. All of this is contained in the 201 Study Guide.

ABOUT THE HYPERVISOR

The Hypervisor used in these lab exercises is VMware Workstation Player™. The reason we have used this hypervisor instead of other open-source alternatives is simply because the F5 Virtual Machine is not fully compliant with some of the open-source hypervisors currently available.

OBTAINING THE HYPERVISOR

VMware Workstation Player™

To obtain your VMware Workstation Player™ go to this link.

OBTAINING THE VIRTUAL MACHINES

The F5 LTM Virtual Machine

In order to obtain your very own BIG-IP® Virtual Edition lab machine you will first have to register for a free F5 account. If you already have one you simply have to log in and follow the instructions. Please verify that the email address assigned to your account is correct as the Base Registration Key will be sent to this address.

The Base Registration Key is required to activate your BIG-IP® VE machine.

After you have received your base registration key, download your BIG-IP® Virtual Edition (VE) from F5. In order to give you the correct user experience, make sure you download BIG-IP version 12.1.2.

Visit F5 to Register for a Free 90-day Trial

Requires F5 Support Account

To obtain your BIG-IP® Virtual Edition (VE) evaluation key go to this link and follow the instructions.

Download Your BIG-IP® Virtual Edition (VE)

Requires F5 Support Account

To download your BIG-IP® Virtual Edition (VE) go to this link.

Make sure you download BIGIP-12.1.2.0.0.249.ALL-scsi.ova !

Use the following instructions:

  1. Click on Find a Download.
  2. Choose the Product Line BIG-IP v12.x / Virtual Edition.
  3. In the drop-down menu choose 12.1.2.
  4. Click on Virtual-Edition.
  5. If necessary, accept the Software Terms and Conditions.
  6. Click on BIGIP-12.1.2.0.0.249.ALL-scsi.ova.
  7. Select the download mirror appropriate for your location.

   The Client Virtual Machine

Please use any of the following download mirrors in order to obtain the client virtual machine.

User Credentials

  • Username: root
  • Password: f5training

MD5 Hashsum: 476df323616372c2c7e378dad9ad2ee1

   The Server Virtual Machine

Please use any of the following download mirrors in order to obtain the tomcat server virtual machine.

User Credentials

  • Username: root
  • Password: f5training

MD5 Hashsum: e90b1aed7013feb6429d04b799436873

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Assistance
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