vExpert Spotlight: Nick Carbone
Nick Carbone
Today’s vExpert Spotlight interview is with Nick Carbone. Nick is a virtualization nerd from the West Coast (Wessssside!) who is also a VMUG leader in Los Angeles. Let’s welcome Nick to the hot seat and see what he has to share with us today.
The Interview
Star Wars or Star Trek?
Star Wars
Peanut Butter?
Crunchy
Favorite Adult Beverage?
Scotch
What was your 1st IT gig?
My first IT gig was working desktop support for a local hospital. I was hired on to help with the deployment of desktops and printers for roughly 200 rooms in a newly built wing of the hospital. Through that experience I learned a lot about OS deployments and Active Directory. This is also where I discovered the awesomeness of the Sysinternals tools.
What is your current job title and role?
I currently work as a Solutions Architect for a local VAR in Los Angeles. My current role is heavily focused on VMware and hyper-converged technologies and I spend most days meeting and talking with customers or working on implementations.
How many years have you been a vExpert?
1 year
What other IT Communities are you involved with or frequent?
VMUG Leader duties & also a PernixPro
What advice would you give to others involved in the VMware community who are looking at becoming a vExpert?
The best piece of advice I can give to someone is to start sharing knowledge and information that is not already out there. You can do this by writing blog content, being an active member on the VMTN communities or speaking at your local VMUG. Definitely speak at your local VMUG!
Do you currently have a Home Lab environment?
I am fortunate to be able to run a decently sized home lab. My current setup is:
3 x Supermicro X8SIL-F with 32GB of RAM
Whitebox NAS
Cisco SG500
Palo Alto Networks PA-200How do you use VMware products or services in your daily work life?
I install and configure different VMware products for our customers. When I am not working on implementations I do a lot of lab work simulating customer environments and working on Horizon View and vRealize Automation extensibility.
What certifications do you currently hold (if any)?
VCP5-DCV & VCP5-DT
Tell us something about yourself that the community may not already know.
During my junior year of high school I started hosting counter-strike and ventrilo servers. Spending time tuning and troubleshooting those systems was the catalyst for me to choose IT as a career.
What’s your go to song or music genre when work stress becomes too much?
If I am stressed or need to get stuff done I generally listen to Explosions in the Sky.
Do you have a blog that you would like to share?
Let us know how to contact you via social media.
Twitter: @vCarbs_
LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/nicktcarbone
Nick thank you for joining the vExpert Spotlight today! I appreciate your time and hope to see you in San Fran next week!
Please follow Nick on Twitter & also on LinkedIn & his personal blog.
Lookup and browse the current 2014 vExperts in the vExpert Online Directory
Learn more about VMware’s vExpert Program: https://communities.vmware.com/community/vmtn/vexpert
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