Prepping for Exam

Hi all, I'm new to Tech Exams. I was just offered a position within my organization that requires CISSP. I have to submit my resume for the position within the next month and a half, and have to take my CISSP with a quickness. I have been in IT since the 80's, even running a BBS in the early 90s, and worked in the military is satellite spacecraft control and networking, WAN/LAN networking, extensive linux experience, have a CCNA, and currently work as a software engineer.

Due to work requirements I can't take a boot camp, and have the test scheduled for 2/27. Basically my training consists of Shon Harris' AIO, 11th Hour, and CCCure paid quizes. I hope to report back here that I passed, but I'd lie if I said I wasn't nervous!

This site has been a great resource so far, thanks to everyone who contributes.

Oh and this is for CISSP, since I left it out of the title and can't add it now.

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AverageJoe

As another old military IT guy who also ran a BBS in the 90s and passed the CISSP last year, I'd say you have good sources, good experience, and a good shot at passing the CISSP your first time. Good luck!

seigex

REMOVED UNNECESSARY QUOTED REPLY FROM PREVIOUS POST

Thanks! I miss the old BBS days, I was just reminiscing about the Legend of the Red Dragon board game, and running a FIDO Net server in the pre-internet days with my 2400 baud modem haha

dustervoice

If you must pass within a 1.5 months, i would recommend the Sybex or Eric Conrad 2nd edition book as your main study guide and use Shon Harris for your weak areas. your experience should help you a lot for the test. I would also recommend you read all the "passed" treads on this forum and use the following free resources for practice questions. Good luck and please share the good news with us when you pass.

McGraw-Hill Education | CISSP Practice Exams
Elsevier: conrad: CISSP Study Guide Practice Exams
https://www.skillset.com/login

H3||scr3am

I'd like to suggest the following plan:
read 11th hour
Purchase all CISSP Studiscope assessments, and do them
take feedback from those test, and brush up on weak areas usining AIO
redo studiscope
do CCCure
do total tester exam that came with AIO
when you're passing with 80-90% consistently in them all:
do CISSP exam!

Best of luck on it, and let us know how it goes

seigex

@dustervoice

Thanks, I noticed the Eric Conrad used to be on sale for $1 a year ago, but is doesn't seem to be the case anymore, but I'll definitely look into those. I actually only have 3 weeks, so I'm doubting whether or not I'll be able to finish the 1450 pages in Son Harris' book.

With the CCCure I've been getting consistently 80 to 90%, except for on one of the domains I thought I had the most experience, imagine that. One of those things where I'm familiar with the theory and application, but not so much with the specific terminology anymore. I'm not sure how closely CCCure tracks with the actual test, though, so hopefully that's a good gauge.

@H3||scr3am

Thanks! I'll look into those as well.

One question, I already have a CISSP willing to endorse me. I notice on the forum people are posting that the turn around time is 5-ish weeks for ISC2 to endorse with resume submission, is the turn around the same when I'm providing the endorsement? I need to get the certificate in as part of the interview process before the resume submission close date. Unfortunately, where I work, even though I was offered the job, I still have to go through the hiring process for a new position.

Thanks again.

nelson8403

Also depending on your learning style you can sign up for a free trial of CBT Nuggets and use their videos, they give a great overview.

Also take a look out here for the sunflower pdf and there's another passed post with a 60 page cliff notes too for last minute studying, I passed mine Thursday with about the same notice for taking the exam.

Good Luck!

seigex

Thanks! I just signed up for this and watching the videos now. I'm a visual learner, so it's easier for me to absorb information from watching an instructor on a whiteboard than reading, so this works out perfectly to solidify what I read in the books.

Archon

Wow, only 1.5 months to study. The CBT nuggets are good to get a quick and fairly basic over view of the whats required. Good luck.

seigex

Archon wrote: »

Wow, only 1.5 months to study. The CBT nuggets are good to get a quick and fairly basic over view of the whats required. Good luck.

Was actually had only 21 days to study!

Tomorrow's my test, I read through some of AIO and most of Eric Conrad's CISSP Study Guide, did many many exams, getting between 70 and 90%. Not sure how that'll scale, but I'll report back tomorrow afternoon with the good (or bad, God forbid) news.

LionelTeo

StudisScope is a waste of money from my experience. GISP Practice Test would worth much more than StudisScope, someone else in this forum who has passed CISSP and have taken transcender and GISP Practice also recommends transcender over GISP practice. Take your pick, but in any I wouldn't recommend studiScope and I would sincerely hope you to reconsider that option.

My take is that if you can pass GISP Practice Test, you can definitely pass CISSP, but transcender may be slightly more worth to put your money in, it depends how much money you have, but I would recommend you to consider this two options over others base on what I have gone through and read on this forum.

seigex

just got out of the exam and I passed!!!

mjsinhsv

Congrats seigex.
How long did it take you?
Did you feel like you were ready for it?

seigex

Tad over 4 hours..3 for the test..1 for skipped answers and flagged and a 10 min break for a snack..decided to skip the full review I started because I was second guessing answers.

I was at information overload...so that kind of scared me but I was going over the PDF from this site during final review and realized all the material was sticking. CCCUre and Total Tester helped a lot to really drill in the technical details.

zeeback

Congratz seigex, can you share your experience, how much time you took and which resources you used to clear your exam. I have scheduled my exam for April'2015. Please do share the details that I should follow to be successful.
Also, let me know which questions shall I practice the good quality questions for practice?

seigex

zeeback wrote: »

Congratz seigex, can you share your experience, how much time you took and which resources you used to clear your exam. I have scheduled my exam for April'2015. Please do share the details that I should follow to be successful.
Also, let me know which questions shall I practice the good quality questions for practice?

Thanks!

My main sources were Eric Conrad's 11th hour, CBT Nuggets (used the free trial to watch them all), CCCUre & Total Tester free demo CISSP questions. I just kept running 250 question tests, switching between study and test mode. Read through Eric Conrad's CISSP Study Guide last weekend.

I have experience in most of the domain content from over the years, but needed to learn the specific concepts that CISSP focuses on. As others have said on here, CISSP exam is from a higher level (more scenario based questions), not so many of the technical details, but you need those technical details to make informed decisions on what the questions ask you.

Good luck!

EDIT: Also print out that the summary PDF from this site.. and read through that a few hours before the test to keep it fresh in memory, it really helped.

zeeback

seigex wrote: »

Thanks!

My main sources were Eric Conrad's 11th hour, CBT Nuggets (used the free trial to watch them all), CCCUre & Total Tester free demo CISSP questions. I just kept running 250 question tests, switching between study and test mode. Read through Eric Conrad's CISSP Study Guide last weekend.

I have experience in most of the domain content from over the years, but needed to learn the specific concepts that CISSP focuses on. As others have said on here, CISSP exam is from a higher level (more scenario based questions), not so many of the technical details, but you need those technical details to make informed decisions on what the questions ask you.

Good luck!

EDIT: Also print out that the summary PDF from this site.. and read through that a few hours before the test to keep it fresh in memory, it really helped.

Thanks! can you let me know where can I find summary PDF document on this site?

seigex

this is the one: http://www.kilala.nl/Sysadmin/Images/CISSP_Summary_V1.1.pdf

It's a great resource!

zeeback

Thanks alot, this will really help.