What is needed to build your vSphere lab on VMware Workstation

This will cover all software and hardware that you will need to setup a home lab with VMware Workstation.

Hardware:

• Physical PC can be a laptop or desktop i would recommend having no less then an Intel i7 or Xenon processor.
• As for the memory I would recommend having no less then 16 GB  but 32 GB will help a lot and even 64 GB is better. The more memory you have the more VMs you will be able to run.
• As for Storage you have a few options use internal storage on the laptop or desktop or get a NAS solution. Since this is about low cost I would go with the internal storage but make sure it is a SSD drive with no less then 500 GB. I found that a old spinning desk just will not give you the performance you need.
• Network adapters on physical system should be 1 but 2 can add a few options as far as networking goes. The rest of this guide will be based off of using just 1 network adapter.
• Networking equipment if you want to connect to external systems you will need a switch or router to connect to so that you can access your VMs.

Software:

• First you will need VMware Workstation you can get this software here. This guide will be based off of version 14 running on Microsoft Windows.
• Next you will need to get some Microsoft software license. 
• Server 2016 eval here
• Windows 10 eval here
• Next you will need access to VMware software you can download the eval copy's here.

VMware Workstation Basic Setup:

1) Start VMware workstation and select edit then preferences from the edit menu.

2) Under the workspace preferences menu Change the default location for virtual machines to the storage location you plan to place the VMs this should be some kind of SSD storage.