70-686 pass

lukethejohnson

Passed the 70-686 today. I passed the 70-680 over a year ago and the original plan was to get the MCSA win7 and then the MCSA Server2012R2. Unfortunately life and work got in the way and delayed me taking the 70-686 and I missed the MCSA 7 before it was retired. No matter, I still received the MCITP: Enterprise Desktop Admin on Win7 which I can upgrade to the MCSA Server2012R2 with the 70-417. Hopefully I have that in the next 3 months. Might try and upgrade to the MCSA Win8 too before that is retired.

If anyone is still taking this exam, my advice would be don't expect it to be like most of the practice test and training videos you see. It would seem to me, most of these were created around 2010 when the test first came out, but the test has been updated since. The format included 2 case studies (never heard these mentioned from any of my training resources) where you were given a TON of information (much of it extraneous) and asked 4 questions about it. It's mostly reading comprehension and sorting out the useful and useless information. I used CBT nuggets, Wiley publishing "Windows 7 Desktop Support and Administration: Real World Skills for MCITP Certification and Beyond ", and the practice exams in the booster pack. I bought the booster pack with the practice exams and 4 retakes. Luckily I didn't need the retakes. I would say the booster pack exams/ flash cards were the most useful, and truest to the test. The 686 is definitely harder than the 680, but still very doable. Hope this helps somebody.

greg9891

Congrats !