I keep failing the 70-685 Exam

Buckles

The first attempt was a throw away- I fell sick on the day and shouldn't have gone but they make it so difficult to pull out if you fall ill 24 hours before hand.
This will be my fifth attempt. If I do fail again, I will need to appeal because this exam is necessary for my next promotion so I don't have the choice of pulling out really. Half the battle for me are the exam questions themselves. They don't always provide verbose explanations for the answers available so I fall into the trap of picking the more detailed one which may not be best answer. Crap like that As i've said before, I use my communication skills to drill down with a Customer on the problem.. this exam doesn't really allow for that. You are given your choices and no matter how vague, it could be the right answer.
Anyway- in each exam attempt (I don't consider my first), I've been about 50 to 100 points off. I know I'm not far.. I just need to fine tune. Thanks for the wishes..I'll need them

Buckles

I've just gone and thrown a bit of cash down on the uCertify course for 70-685. They have a truck load of questions, pre assessments and a decent amount of reading. I'll lab in conjunction with it and see how I fair.

Judderman88

My company have very kindly just given me an exam voucher for this so gonna aim for the second week in May and keep Second Shot in the bank if need be

Buckles

Judderman88 wrote: »

My company have very kindly just given me an exam voucher for this so gonna aim for the second week in May and keep Second Shot in the bank if need be

That's actually when I was looking at taking it too! I'm travelling for a week with work as well in between now and then so I'll see how I fair with all that going on..
Thankfully, I've managed to score a voucher too! ... It offsets the money I'm spending on training material which is a win-win I guess..

Smilodon31

Good luck buckles. Hopefully you will nail it this time and get that promotion.

Buckles

Smilodon31 wrote: »

Good luck buckles. Hopefully you will nail it this time and get that promotion.

Thank you Smilodon! .... I'll get there!

Domestic

Buckles, the more I study for this the more I can understand your battle with this exam. It is cruel that so many IT certs are comprised of multiple exams and it can be pretty boring/depressing going over the same sub topics when it comes to this material. BoL your next attempt.

Buckles

Domestic wrote: »

Buckles, the more I study for this the more I can understand your battle with this exam. It is cruel that so many IT certs are comprised of multiple exams and it can be pretty boring/depressing going over the same sub topics when it comes to this material. BoL your next attempt.

Cheers Domestic. I've had a bit of a mental break from it- I haven't studied over the long weekend break at all; it's been great!
In saying that, I've started studying again but i'm starting with W2K8 R2 active directory etc through Train Signal.
Then i'm starting on the uCertify study material and the videos again. The most frustrating thing is misunderstanding questions time and time again. The devil is in the details ... Thanks for the wishes. Hope your study has been productive. If I can help in any way, inbox me.

Swift6

Failure makes you stronger. A bit of a break should give you that fresh boost of motivation.
Good luck.

Smilodon31

Judderman88 wrote: »

Ouch Buckles, 6?
To be fair, I failed it once and walked away. Need to pull my socks up and am becoming a hermit for April.
Once done, 70-689 appeals

Best of luck to both Buckles and Smilodon

Good luck to you too judderman88, I have taken a long break from studying but will get stuck in now. I will try to book the test before the 31st of may to have the second shot available.

Judderman88

Thanks Smilodon
Lets hope we can all report back with good news in the coming weeks

Gopas

I think the 685 exam covers more wider contents than 680 or 686.

Trying 685 for twice but failed, therefore I'm preparing 686 exam instead. It feels more easier to me.

The obvious thing is, practicing and challenging results in pass. But time is the problem. Cheer up.

ksmith0001

Did you passed it in March? If so, what did you do?

Buckles

Judderman88 wrote: »

Thanks Smilodon
Lets hope we can all report back with good news in the coming weeks

Judderman, have you attempted the exam again yet? I'm booked in for 27th May

Buckles

I'm proud to say I've just passed my 70-685 Exam.. BY THE SKIN OF MY TEETH!


Fifth and final attempt.......

700/1000

I don't care. I'm just glad this chapter in my life is over.
I stand by my previous claims- this is the hardest exam i've ever taken and it comes down to the wording.

I can highly recommend the uCertify online training package for 70-685. That with the addition of the Pluralsight 70-680/70-642 videos and Technet.

Domestic

Congratulations Buckle, I was able to pass it on Friday also. Neither of my passes on each of these exams were pretty but like you said just glad it is over. I felt like I got a lot "shorter" questions on my second attempt as well as less "choose all that apply" questions, makes it less difficult.

Buckles

Domestic wrote: »

Congratulations Buckle, I was able to pass it on Friday also. Neither of my passes on each of these exams were pretty but like you said just glad it is over. I felt like I got a lot "shorter" questions on my second attempt as well as less "choose all that apply" questions, makes it less difficult.

Well done mate! Even though I just passed, I felt that reminding myself with every question that "this is has to be done the MS way" really helped...also took a lot of notes.. even if a random thought about another question or technology came to mind.. just scribbled it down. Those "choose all that apply" are painful. I got my case studies out of the way in the beginning too.... that allowed me to focus in on the other 41 questions....

Smilodon31

Buckles wrote: »

I'm proud to say I've just passed my 70-685 Exam.. BY THE SKIN OF MY TEETH!


Fifth and final attempt.......

700/1000

I don't care. I'm just glad this chapter in my life is over.
I stand by my previous claims- this is the hardest exam i've ever taken and it comes down to the wording.

I can highly recommend the uCertify online training package for 70-685. That with the addition of the Pluralsight 70-680/70-642 videos and Technet.

Congrats buckles, I am glad you put this one to bed. What is your next step going to be?

Buckles

Smilodon31 wrote: »

Congrats buckles, I am glad you put this one to bed. What is your next step going to be?

Smilodon, your recommendation to go over the Ed Lieberman videos on AD/DS etc proved to be invaluable. I'm plugging uCertify again but I certainly found their way of teaching to be helpful...I've got a feeling they used Darril Gibson's work under some sort of copyright permission.
In conjunction with with some interactive quizzes, the volume of questions and the style of questioning helped.

As to my next step, I need to get through one more fixed step training course test (it's an easy one) that my company requires for my promotion and then honestly...... I haven't thought about it. This exam has been a part of my life for the last 7 months in one way or another. I'm looking forward to stepping off the gas for a little while..
I walked into my study last night and saw a pile of notes, books and practice exam print outs...At that point, I realised It's all over ...

I do want to keep learning in one way or another though, I know that much. Maybe a project management course like PRINCE...or whatever my company tells me I need for my next promotion ...

Thanks again for your advice and support mate. Appreciate it!

ksmith0001

Cograts Buckles, I am heading to the frontlines of the battlefield on Saturday for the second time. I want to feel your relief on Saturday.

Buckles

ksmith0001 wrote: »

Cograts Buckles, I am heading to the frontlines of the battlefield on Saturday for the second time. I want to feel your relief on Saturday.

Mate, gear up and give it your best shot.

I'm just telling you what I did differently.... It may or may not be of help to you

My recommendations before you hit the start button... remember you don't have to click straight through everything at the beginning immediately..take a moment to close your eyes and use the opportunity to recall.....If you're feeling nervous, anxious or stressed.. do some deep breathing relaxation. This helped me de-stress and focus.
I actually made the mistake of reviewing my notes that morning before I took the exam. It made me more stressed and I had to just close my eyes and Woosa it away (if you get the Bad Boys 2 Reference :P)

- While you're sitting in the exam room with the note pad, think about your weaker points, the stuff you took extra effort to remember.. Write it down.. all of it...
- During the exam, if any other random thoughts about technologies/settings/... whatever...come to mind, write it down. It could save you down the track if you get stuck on a question and start getting frustrated.
- As you know, You can always hit that review button and come back to it later.. if you're remotely like me... my brain will be processing a question in the background and the answer may not come immediately but It does down the track. Then I jump back to it. I don't know if it saved me or not but I came back and changed a few answers...

As you know, I just passed. This either knocked me back a few points or just got me over the finish line.

Best of luck to you Ksmith!

Judderman88

Nice one Buckles and Domestic, glad you got it squared away. I also passed the 70-685 yesterday with a 766, hence being off the radar studying. To be honest, even though it was my second attempt at this exam , I found it easier than the 70-680. And I note from the MS transcript that they still give you MCITP which is a nice bonus! Best of luck to KSmith

Smilodon31

Buckles I am sorry to hear that ED's 2k8 series were not beneficial to you. I only recommended it to you because, you mentioned in one of your posts that you needed to strengthen your knowledge of 2k8 and Gpo's. It has really helped me with the 70-680 and I wouldn't have passed the 70-680 as there were few questions that I managed to answer correctly thanks to those videos. Microsoft exams are hard and the books only cover about 70% the rest is from experience at work, and the more you know the better.

Anyway I am glad you passed mate , congratulations once again and all the best for the future.

Smilodon31

Judderman88 wrote: »

Nice one Buckles and Domestic, glad you got it squared away. I also passed the 70-685 yesterday with a 766, hence being off the radar studying. To be honest, even though it was my second attempt at this exam , I found it easier than the 70-680. And I note from the MS transcript that they still give you MCITP which is a nice bonus! Best of luck to KSmith

Good on you Judderman88, glad you passed it. Unfortunately I couldn't get ready in time and book it in may. So there goes my 2nd shot. At least this way now I can slow down and do things more thoroughly.
Good luck ksmith.

Buckles

Nice one Judder! For some reason I found 680 easier... go figure ...

Nice to see everyone is kicking goals!

ksmith0001

I passed it today guys with 900. I want to thank you guys for your advice. I was discourage after the first time I failed it. I think the grading scale for this exam focus more on sequence questions.

Domestic

ksmith0001 wrote: »

I passed it today guys with 900. I want to thank you guys for your advice. I was discourage after the first time I failed it. I think the grading scale for this exam focus more on sequence questions.

This is also the impression I got after failing it the first time.

Buckles

ksmith0001 wrote: »

I passed it today guys with 900. I want to thank you guys for your advice. I was discourage after the first time I failed it. I think the grading scale for this exam focus more on sequence questions.

Wow!! Congratulations! It makes perfect sense that sequence/multiple pick questions would have a higher weighting than your typical multiple choice...I'm also guessing the case studies may carry a different weighting too.

Buckles

Side note- I love that this thread has flipped around to everyone sharing their success stories ... Great to read!

RellyRale

Im about to take my 70-685 in a few weeks this was very encouraging thanks yall for sharing your stories