IT certification study tips

IT Certs on a Song…or a Shoestring

My favorite recipe for preparing for an IT certification goes something like this:

1. Purchase one (or at most two) big fat study guides on your exam topic (I often call these books “doorstops” for a very good reason). Usual cost: $50 a pop, cheaper if you can buy used via Amazon, HalfPrice, and so forth.

2. Purchase an Exam Cram on the same exam topic. Usual cost $20-30.

3. Purchase a good set of practice tests from a reputable well-known vendor such as Boson, Transcender, and so forth. Costs vary by topic from $70 to $150, sometimes more.

4. Beg, borrow, steal, or build a test lab to practice your skills to prepare for the exam. You can spend anywhere from $0 to $1,000 on such gear, but generally costs will be in line with the cost/value of the cert involved.

5. Sign up for the exam of choice, preferably with some kind of discount (search for “discount voucher” or “discount exam voucher” online using the exam ID or some other unique string to identify the cert involved). These days, most cert exams go for $125 and up.

6. Study like heck, practice like the dickens, and squeeze ever iota of info out of your practice tests. Then, take the exam and pass on the first try (if you’re lucky; if possible always look for a Second Shot style deal where the cost of the exam includes a free retake if you don’t pass on the first try).

On the other hand, if you want to see some more good information on exam prep, check out my old tried-and-true 25 Exam Prep Tips at HyperLearn.com, or Eric Geier’s great little article “IT Certifications on a Shoestring Budget.” Either way, you can’t go wrong.

CompTIA Lets New Network+ Loose on the World

With the organization’s decision to hew to ISO9000 requirements regarding training and certification, it looks like CompTIA will be refreshing and updating its credentials on a rather less leisurely schedule going forward. The latest Network+, released on January 9, is a good case in point. Though the previous version is called Network+ 2007 (it was refreshed in that year) it actually launched in 2005. Expect to see CompTIA on a pretty rigorous 2 to 3 year exam refresh cycle from here on out, though.

What’s new in Network+ 2009? Here are some random factoids:

• Exam ID: N10-004 (JK0-016 Education); previous N10-003 (JK0-012 Education)
• Number of questions: 100; previous 90
• Cut score (minimum passing score): 720 (80%); previous 554 (62%)
• A formal “Bridge Exam” for individuals who hold the N10-003/JK0-012 Network+
• Substantially revised exam objectives, and a rebalancing among exam domains with new (and welcome) security, devices, and tools domains.
• Lots of new/modern networking coverage, including IPv6, APIPA, authentication and encryption, wiring standards, WAN technologies, network performance optimization, and security topics galore.
• The Acronym list is up to a full four pages and gives a pretty good idea of what you need to recognize and know.

I’ve always thought Network+ was a pretty good exam and credential, and this one continues solidly in that vein. Highly recommended for entry level IT workers seeking to demonstrate some basic but useful networking chops. Members pay $191 for the exam, non-members $239; the bridge exam costs $135/170 (members/non-members).

Check Out GoCertify.com

My colleague and long-time certification industry expert, Anne Martinez, runs a very nice Web site called GoCertify.com. There’s lots of interesting content there, not least of which is the information available through its Certifications database, as depicted in this partial screencap from that page:

I’ve used this tool myself many times over the years to slice and dice certification offerings available to the market in all kinds of ways. Ms. Martinez keeps this database reasonably current, making it an unusually good place from which to start looking for information about certifications by topic, expertise level, type (vendor-neutral vs. vendor-specfiic) and a whole lot more.

As an added bonus, check out this interesting story entitled “Five Certification Mistakes You Don’t Have to Make.” You’ll find some interesting thoughts and observations here, good enough for me to repeat the primary points by way of illustration (the ideas are hers, but the pithy paraphrases are mine):

• Don’t choose a certification just because it’s hot or in high demand.
• Don’t choose a certification because it’s easy to earn.
• Don’t assume your employer won’t help with cert costs.
• Shop around for the best certification deals
• Be sure to set–and stick to–your own certification deadlines

This is definitely one of those cases where I’m happy to let a fellow expert speak for herself, because there’s a lot of material in here I couldn’t have said better myself. Check it out!

–Ed–

Prepping for Cert Exams

You know that old saying: “You can never be too rich, or too thin?” Well, I think a variation on that theme applies to preparing for certification exams: “You can never be too prepared, or too ready!” To that end, I’ve compiled a bunch of advice on preparing for exams that readers may find interesting. Here’s an annotated list of some stuff to help you review the process, and make yourself as ready as possible for a certification exam when one is coming your way:

• Emmett Dulaney, another incredliby experienced and knowledgeable certification guy, has put together a nice compilation of tips at CertCities. Scroll down in this article until you get to the heading that reads “Pre-Pre-Exam Study.” There, he talks about improving basic test-taking skills, and discusses some common-sense and logic you can use to separate obvious bad/wrong answers from those worth further consideration when digging into multiple-choice (aka “multiple-guess”) questions.
• Thanks to my good buddy Will Harper at HyperLearn.com, you can get a peek at my immortal classic, “25 Tips to Pass Your Certification Exam,” whcih I first put together for CramSession.com in 2002, I think. This advice has withstood the test of time better than I expected it to when I first wrote it, and remains surprisingly relevant today. If you visit the HyperLearn page, you’ll find an addition 5-tip bonus I wrote for them to add some value to this offering.
• Back in the Coriolis era of Exam Cram, I wrote a book called IT Certification Success that went through three editions there. Que later picked it up and it went through numerous reprints there, too, though the edition never changed. You can pick this book up used for a song and although its exam details are way out of date, its basic study and test taking strategy info remains on target.
• Visit Certification Magazine and search on “tittel exam prep” there. You’ll find oodles and scads of information that includes pointers and tips on Microsoft, Sun, Linux, CompTIA, Cisco, Citrix, CheckPoint, PMI/PMP, and HP exams, among others.

The real problem with exam prep is making sure to give yourself enough time to do it right. Don’t forget to look over these various resources as you start down the preparation trail, but be sure and make yourself entirely familiar with exam content and questions before your scheduled rendezvous pops up at your friendly neighborhood testing center!

–Ed–

If at first you don’t succeed, try again!

Microsoft Learning has been running its Second Shot program on and off since the late 90’s. It works like this:

• You register for a specific second short offer
• You obtain a Second Shot exam voucher, with a voucher number included
• You sign up for and take an MCP exam of some kind at Prometric, and provide your Second Shot voucher number as part of the exam sign-up process
• If you pass, good on you. If you fail, you can exercise your Second Shot voucher to take it again for free (you must again provide the voucher number to do this, so keep that information in a safe place)

You have until June 30, 2009 to register for any MCP exam whose exam number begins with 070 (and any number of such exams, in fact), complete your first exam, and retake that exam if you don’t pass on a first try. Note: you must make it through this entire process by the cut-off date to take advantage of this offer.

It’s a pretty good offer, so if you do have to take any MCP exams between now and May, 2009, you should probably bookmark this blog so you can follow the links to take advantage. I won’t go so far as to recommend that you take the exam first just to reconnoiter and use it to guide your studies for the retake, but some folks have been known to turn this into a deliberate study/prep strategy.

HTH,
–Ed–

Check the “Beta Exam Announcements” Blog for MS Beta Exam Info

Not ‘By Invitation Only’ Any More!

Normally, you have to hold a Microsoft certification of some kind and your e-mail address has to make its way onto a beta exam invitation list before you become eligible to take a beta certification exam. The invitation e-mail has long been the only way to find out about upcoming Microsoft beta certification exams and to obtain the information needed to reserve yourself a seat at Prometric. But if you know where to look, you can sidestep that process. Microsoft Learning runs a Beta Exam Announcements Blog where the same text that goes into the invitation e-mails gets posted for those in the know.

Right now, the following beta exams are underway (remember exam numbers for betas take the form 71-xxx where the final form will be 70-xxx, and xxx is a three digit number):

• 71-433: TS: Microsoft SQL Server 2008, Database Development 9/22-10/10/2008
• 71-403: TS: Microsoft System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2008, Configuring 9/30-10/24/2008

Thus, beta exam 71-433 will become 70-433 when it is finalized and goes “live;” likewise, 71-403 will become 70-403 as well.

You can also dig deeper into the blog to see which exams have gone through beta recently, so as to know what to expect to show up in final form some time soon. It usually takes 3-5 months after the beta is complete for the final, commercial version of the exam to go public. The best thing about beta exams is that if you can get a seat you can sometimes take them for free; always for a reduced fee. And if you pass a beta exam, it’s just like passing the real thing: it counts toward whatever Microsoft certifications you may be pursuing.

If you’re actively engaged in MS certification, I recommend you add the blog URL to your favorites or bookmarks, and visit it at least once a month. You’ll have a good idea about upcoming exams in the pipeline, and you will get an occasional chance to take a beta at lower cost or even no cost. It doesn’t get any better than that!