Anyone About start MCSA,A+,N+?

[sparkeh]

Thanks Little-Miss. Think I may be going over the top with my study, the type of person I am means I *have* to learn every detail of the course material. I could give you an interesting lecture on the history and development of the mouse connector

[Little-Miss]

Well fair play to you! I wish i could store information like that in my pea brain. Unless the exam has changed drastically since July i dont think you have to go that in depth.

[wagnerk]

Originally Posted by russdev

Also check out Cert mag as well load of good resources about certs in general. Also have a help column (Certification Magazine - Dear Techie) by some guy supposedly knows what he going on about

Certification Magazine

Russ

Thanks mate, lol

-Ken

[russdev]

Wasn't sure if to start a new thread or not for so now will leave it in this thread but if people think we should start a new thread each week then will move it etc.

Week two Question of the Week: -


What one new thing did you learn this week?

For me and this may sound daft it was proper name for USB cable plugs

Russell

[russdev]

*bump*

[dezt]

seen as i'm at the start of my study material, the newest thing i've learnt this week is microsofts correct usage of groups, and the difference between the different sorts.

Pretty basic stuff at the moment, boring as well as i think to myself i already know that, but daren't skip anything in case i'm wrong.

[russdev]

This is me doing my school master routine now Mark, Jame, BaccyNet, little-miss, joanne and joe what did you learn this week

Well I said would try and keep you all on track

Russ

[Little-Miss]

Well i'm an MCDST and an A+ Professional IT Technician (or something along those lines).
I'm in the process of trying to enroll for the 290 (i think it is) so currently not studying. I'll be keeping an eye on this thread though

(remembering the proper name for a USB cable sucks)

[russdev]

Originally Posted by Little-Miss

Well i'm an MCDST and an A+ Professional IT Technician (or something along those lines).
I'm in the process of trying to enroll for the 290 (i think it is) so currently not studying. I'll be keeping an eye on this thread though

(remembering the proper name for a USB cable sucks)

Show off ok will forgive you then if not started yet

[BaccyNet]

I'd love to say I learnt something new this week, but been trying to sort out what I'm going to do without an exam centre I can get to

(hopefully mr russdev will allow this excuse, its much better than the dog eating my homework)

[somabc]

OK In a sudden fit of motivation I have finally put together a (master) plan for the Certs that I want to achieve. I have attached a pdf if anyone could take look and check I'm not on the wrong track.

Basically I want to maximise the qualifications and minimise the cost / no of exams to sit.

My plan is to do the CompTIA A+ & Network+ first as they seem like a good place to start and give exemptions to some MS elective courses.

Then my plan is to achieve MCDST -> MCSA -> MCSE, next I can convert these to Server 2008's MCITP. I think the server 2003 track still has the best brand recognition, ie employers will take more notice of having an MCSE than MCITP Server Admin for just now.

My plan is to achieve MCSE by end of 2009 through self study, looking at roughly 3 months per block of courses. I will probably factor in a CCNA as well but it looks like it is better done on a course with the right CISCO kit.

I will be looking to get some guide books and possibly some software / videos but that will be sorted out nearer the time. I gather for my first 2 CompTIA courses some books and practice exams should be OK?

OK so I need a server to build my lab - At first Server 2003 with a few XP clients then later server 2008 with some Vista clients as well. I am looking at buying this Quad Core server and maxing out the RAM to 4GB?

PcBuyIt :

What do you recommend for virtualizing the lab? Specifically for networking the hosts / clients together with Server 2003 being the DHCP server but my own little broadband router still letting VMs access the internet?

Thanks for the Help / Advice.

[BaccyNet]

@somabc - Not to sound too negative here but I think that your plan to achieve MCSE status in a year through self-study is a bit ambitious! I take it you will be working full-time during the year? When will you be studying?

On a positive note, doing the CompTIA stuff first is a good idea. They were the easiest certs to get for me and start to get your mind into the whole self-study thing if you havnt done it before.

As for the server, I'm currently using VMWare on my home PC with four virtual machines. I've then setup an internal network inside VMWare as well as allowing the server VM out onto the Internet. It does require a stack of memory though if you plan to run that many machines at one time!

Hope this helps

[somabc]

Thanks Baccynet,

Hey 'theres nowt wrong with ambition' as my fictitious Yorkshire grandfather used to say.

Its hard for me to say how long it will take in total as I have never sat any of these courses or similar before so I have no idea whatsoever of how long it actually takes.

Having worked in IT for several years doing the kind of stuff covered by MCSA/MCSE I guess I am assuming that it will be fairly straightforward to pass the exams but that could be completely misguided of course.

I wrote the whole plan of exams out as it helps to plan which courses are valid for several certificates and which qualify you for exemption.

I think breaking it down into stages is the way to go so a goal of A+ / Network+ before Christmas looks like a plan. If those exams go well, I may try the security+ and linux+ before moving to the Microsoft exams.

[russdev]

Biggest issue with ms exams is not so much if know it but getting into MS way of thinking...

Last week have been bad with half term and seriously being tired some study went out of the window.

Question of the week: -

What topic have you been studying this week remember I have a stick if you do not do your homework..

Myself it was CPU's

Russ

[dezt]

I've been going through my Testout videos, simulations and exam questions for Disk management this week, just finished Raid and volume sets. Moving onto backup now.