What are the databases withing SCOM, and can you describe their characteristics?

As you've probably deduced, this is another technical question which the interviewer is using to continue to explore your knowledge of the SCOM tool. As mentioned earlier, the majority of your interview will consist of operational and technical questions. If you've reviewed the SCOM principles and researched the company's operations, you should have no trouble responding to these types of questions.

"There are two primary databases that are installed when implementing a SCOM instance. These are an operational database and a data warehouse. The operational database contains the configuration for the management group. It also retains the data collected for a short period, the default of which is seven days. The data warehouse stores the monitoring data collected by the agents permanently. SCOM uses this data for reporting and historical analysis purposes. The data is written to both of these databases simultaneously."