Studying for A+????

Legacy User

Hi there!

A friend and I are both studying for the A+ exam. She is taking the class at Itec and I am working on it alone, studying the material from books and online information. My question is, do you think that she is getting better quality information than I am? I am trying to really focus on the Hardware section whereas she is getting both hardware and o/s all at once. Do I need to be studying the software sections in order to pass the hardware test? I'm soooo confused. By the way, her class is only 7 weeks long, 2 days a week and 5 hours each class. Is that really long enough to actually learn all this stuff?

Pavlov

Not sure on the quality of your friend's instructor or if they have a lab with enough equipment for the students to practice with their own computers, but if the class includes a decent lab with new enough equipment and enough for each student then she may be getting more focused material. If you are familiar with computers and have actually opened the case of one without have slight heart palpitations then you're going to be fine studying on your own. I used the All in One book by Mike Meyers and another small set of books that are no longer on the market (I did my A+ back in 1999).

I took both on the same day but definitely approached the material for study separately. I started with the core hardware and then read about the software side. Gave myself 2 hours between the two tests to allow myself to relax and review one last time. You need to break the material into small chunks - to think that you can absorb all these facts and details without some sort of order and discipline will put you at the end of the bar drinking heavily There is a lot to memorize for these tests and there's no shortcut around it - it will come down to strict memorization for the test and know that in the real world you can look it up again if you need to

Ask your friend if you can peek at the material that has been given out in her class and see how close it maps to what you're reading. Quiz each other from your respective materials and that way you will both benefit.

donny

thanks ,
i tried for a plus hardware and failed.
i was talking a class 8 hours a day for a week .
but you need more then that and like you say break it down andmemorize which is something
I almost dread at this point . so it might take me longer since not much disapline for studing these days. I'm just using two bookd from sybexamd a new riders book . one has more detail on dos which is not so important but useful and the other is from the class.
I proly need more books or pictures to look at of things to memorize better. any thing for more visual learners?
thanks

bellboy

the best visual training you can get is hands-on. some of the stuff needs to be learned and memorised, but some will come to you easier by hands-on.

don't forget that using and messing about with o/s, whether it's configuring hardware or whatever, is still o/s hands on!!