You can read all of the books and blogs you like, watch videos, and see presentations. But if you really want to learn some piece of technology, you need to play with it. Break it, and then try and fix it. Maybe implementing that new feature is not as straightforward as the marketing folks imply. Maybe when I install something, it breaks something else. How do I fix this? What can I do to avoid that in the future.
Most companies do not want you experimenting on production equipment. For good reason. However, when the poo hits the fan, they want you to be prepared. So, as I start learning the new features of SQL 2012, I want to build a test lab. This is not nearly as complicated as it was in past years, with the advent of virtualization.
To experiment with all of the features of SQL 2012, I will need several database servers, for implementing AlwaysOn features, experimenting with replication and log shipping, etc. These servers will also need to be part of a domain. All told, I will need at least 4 servers – a domain controller and three SQL servers.
After doing some research, I will be be using VirtualBox (https://www.virtualbox.org/) for creating my environment. There will be follow up posts on how I set up a VirtualBox, my domain, and my servers. One of the key features of VitualBox is that it is free. I have used VMWare in the past, but the free VMWare server version is no longer supported or available, so that is out.
As is often the case, there are other resources out there that may have similar information. If you want to learn lots about SQL and be entertained as well, you should spend some time on www.brentozar.com. There is a specific page on their site that talks about this very same topic, http://www.brentozar.com/archive/2012/04/video-how-test-availability-groups-sql-server/. I will be looking more at the nitty-gritty of getting things set up, but they give a great overview of using some of these items.