Isilon Solutions for Technology Architects is a specialist-level exam that extends the Information Storage and Management (E10-001) exam. It is built around infrastructure solutions but it has some designing solutions as well. All and all, it's about meeting the customer's needs with the best possible solution. Like I said earlier, this is an extension so you need to pass the ISM (E10-001) exam in the first place and then you are eligible to register for this second one. Isilon is one of the EMC's own technologies which provides a simple, powerful and efficient way to manage and consolidate enterprise applications and data.

The concepts you need to research about include Smart Pools, disk pools, SSDs, Workload analysis, performance and tiering, data protection, latency, I/O patterns and data management lifecycle. To give you a better understanding of the exam, I'll show you the most relevant topics which are going to be part of any Isilon Solutions examination.

• Data requirements gathering
• Describing what is a scale-out solution
• Key criteria for evaluating an Isilon solution
• Sizing guidelines
• You'll have to describe an appropriate Isilon solution based on 10 top questions
• Impact file sizes relative to capacity
• Results from various workload analysis tools
• ROI/TCO related factors when designing an Isilon solution
• Caching
• Smart Cache and Endurant Cache - impact
• Describe, read, write about caching benefits
• Data protection
• Explain 4 different protection levels and define Drive and Node SmartFail
• File Striping
• Define the concept and contrast file striping against RAID
• Performance, tiering, data protection
• 2 benefits of SmartPools;
• SnapshotIQ
• How snapshot IQ works and compare copy on write with redirect on write
• SyncIQ
• What a synchronization policy is and explain policy considerations related to replication
• Design, architectural and implementation consideration
• Network topology and network requirements when designing an Isilon
• Identiti management, protocols, authentication sources required when designing an Isilon solution
• Horizontal and vertical markets
• Data requirements associated with designing an Isilon solution for both market types

I know that there are a lot of new stuff around here; that was my reaction too when I first noticed the possible subjects. But once you get an idea about all the topics above, passing the exam will become just a matter of time.

Now it's time to present you the easiest way to get the certification. On the exam page, which can be found here, it's a complete course with all the necessary information for you to pass the test. In the bottom section of the page, colored with blue, you can find the 2 modules needed for the specialist-level examination. They cost $1,200. It's not necessarily the cheapest way of getting your diploma, but it's definitely the fastest. The courses cover absolutely all the necessary topics and they last for 16 and 24 hours. It's all about video/ILT stream so it will be really easy for you to keep up. Unfortunately, I was unable to get my hands on a book simply because Isilon is an EMC concept and it's relatively new on the market.

In the end, more information about the exam. It consists of about 60 questions and you have 105 minutes to solve them all. You can come back and answer the unanswered questions at a later time. You're not allowed to use information material.

We are living in a society where interacting with the customers it's vital for our businesses. You need to know how to explain your thoughts and ideas, how to deal with unexpected situations and sometimes how to convince the client that his idea it's not necessary the best. With Isilon Solution examination certificate you'll have the possibility of proving others that you can interact with customers at a higher level, therefore you are the man for the job.

Alicia Markel, Programmer, Web-Solutions Ltd.