CompTIA PDI+ beta [no longer available]

WanBoy67

Slowhand wrote:

JDMurray wrote:

The exam is about printers and scanners.

Scanners too, huh? I wonder if they dock points for failing to wipe the cheek-prints off the glass after you finish with the device. . .

matradley

wanboy67 wrote:

Slowhand wrote:

JDMurray wrote:

The exam is about printers and scanners.

Scanners too, huh? I wonder if they dock points for failing to wipe the cheek-prints off the glass after you finish with the device. . .

110. Your scanner is producing hazy images with lines through the image at various locations. These lines appear to be round and are consistent regardless of the image or document you scan. Do you:

A) Throw the scanner through the window;
Wipe the glass off with a damp cloth or a glass cleaner
C) Spread cheeks and blow
D) Tell the client that the spots are normal
E) All of the above

Slowhand

I'll go with D. After all, if he keeps bugging me about the scanner, he'll be seeing those same rounded lines on his monitor as well. (You have to be thorough with these users, you know.)

matradley

Slowhand wrote:

I'll go with D. After all, if he keeps bugging me about the scanner, he'll be seeing those same rounded lines on his monitor as well. (You have to be thorough with these users, you know.)

I was thinking of E... You could, "tell the client that the spots are normal," "wipe the glass off with a damp cloth or a glass cleaner" (all while the client bugs you), get pissed off and "Spread cheeks and blow," and "throw the scanner through the window."

Slowhand

matradley wrote:

"throw the scanner through the window."

We can't do that! What a waste of equipment. . . can't we just cut out the middle-man and throw the user out the window?

theseman

Slowhand wrote:

matradley wrote:

"throw the scanner through the window."

We can't do that! What a waste of equipment. . . can't we just cut out the middle-man and throw the user out the window?

Only if the user was upper-management........

JDMurray

I knew the toner in copiers can kill you (there was a big deal about this in Xerox copiers in the 1980's), but now it's been shown that some laser printers can emit toner clouds too? I thought the fuser assembly melted the all toner on to the paper; apparently not all of it.

Your laser printer could be hazardous to your health

theseman

JDMurray wrote:

I knew the toner in copiers can kill you (there was a big deal about this in Xerox copiers in the 1980's), but now it's been shown that some laser printers can emit toner clouds too? I thought the fuser assembly melted the all toner on to the paper; apparently not all of it.

Your laser printer could be hazardous to your health

A co-worker that deals with the printers here told me about this article, coughing the whole time...

Travis

matradley

I know BETA exams are not new... but how long does CompTIA, usually, take to release BETA exam results once you have written the exam. I know that, more than likely, at the end of the exam, I will probably not be receiving results immediately.

JDMurray

matradley wrote:

I know BETA exams are not new... but how long does CompTIA, usually, take to release BETA exam results once you have written the exam.

It took CompTIA a little over four months to send me the result of my DHTI+ beta exam. I have no idea if that is typical or not.

Megadeth4168

Oh well, I have not received the OK from CompTIA for this exam yet. Looks like I might not be taking this one.

matradley

Megadeth4168 wrote:

Oh well, I have not received the OK from CompTIA for this exam yet. Looks like I might not be taking this one.

I wonder why they did not e-mail you back? I received the Promotion and Voucher within 12 hours.

andygee

JDMurray wrote:

I knew the toner in copiers can kill you (there was a big deal about this in Xerox copiers in the 1980's), but now it's been shown that some laser printers can emit toner clouds too? I thought the fuser assembly melted the all toner on to the paper; apparently not all of it.

Your laser printer could be hazardous to your health

The toner and paper dust will over the time will be emited/dropped from the dev unit, transfer unit and drum unit etc it will never have got as far as the fusing unit.

The printers which emitted the higher levels have probaly not been maintained well and had their filters replaced and been vacced out regularly. Notice the mfds have lower levels this are normally serviced more and not run in to the ground like printers.

Basically if you want a low emitting mfd,copier or printer make sure its maintained regularly and change the filters and other components regulary.

Megadeth4168

matradley wrote:

Megadeth4168 wrote:

Oh well, I have not received the OK from CompTIA for this exam yet. Looks like I might not be taking this one.

I wonder why they did not e-mail you back? I received the Promotion and Voucher within 12 hours.

Maybe I screwed up something on the application.... Maybe I made a typo on the email or something.... Or maybe they don't like My Mario avatar or my screen name

Oh well, I'm not really that concerned about it.

andygee

I took the exam last weey as i have been trained in this field i thought i would just have a look at the objectives. The exam was very basic and had a few questions that were a little bit too easy so make sure you read the question just to make sure you don't make a mistake.

For it techs the exam will be useful in giving first line support in printers,faxs(had quite a few questions on fax),copiers,mfds both bw and colour.

For example its useful to know what cmyk means and how it works this will help you when customers start complainig about a colour print not printing correctly. Giving a good diganois of a fault to a copier tech will help them in most cases resolve the problem quicker or even help you over the phone if it is real simple (which at least 30 percent of calls are) this means more up time and less hassle for you.

If you work in IT support (or wish to) and your job includes dealing with these devices it may well be worth you getting this qualfication as may help your cv get to the top of the pile.

matradley

andygee wrote:

I took the exam last weey as i have been trained in this field i thought i would just have a look at the objectives. The exam was very basic and had a few questions that were a little bit too easy so make sure you read the question just to make sure you don't make a mistake.

For it techs the exam will be useful in giving first line support in printers,faxs(had quite a few questions on fax),copiers,mfds both bw and colour.

For example its useful to know what cmyk means and how it works this will help you when customers start complainig about a colour print not printing correctly. Giving a good diganois of a fault to a copier tech will help them in most cases resolve the problem quicker or even help you over the phone if it is real simple (which at least 30 percent of calls are) this means more up time and less hassle for you.

If you work in IT support (or wish to) and your job includes dealing with these devices it may well be worth you getting this qualfication as may help your cv get to the top of the pile.

Thanks for the tips. I will be taking the exam on 8 Aug. Just to confirm, MFDS is?

WanBoy67

Multi-function devices

matradley

wanboy67 wrote:

Multi-function devices

Thanks! I thought it was as simple as that. I usually call them "MFD" or "MFP" so it threw me off a bit.

sthomas

I took the exam yesterday, several of the questions I thought were easy. These questions were things you would run into if you have done or currently do Tech Support. Some of the exam covered customer service stuff and they were mostly common sense. Of course some of the questions I got were difficult for me because I am not familiar with a lot of the proper terminology used for printers, scanners, copiers, and fax machine parts. All in all I would say this is a good exam to take if you provide tech support for printers and scanners, just know the proper names to the parts in printers/copiers and scanners and know the printing process and most will do fine. I think I have a decent chance of passing this one but if I don't I may pick it up later anyway.

Bob Kiwi

I'm signed up for 9AM Friday. Haven't heard from my three other coworkers that I referred to it, though I imagine they would tell me if they were accepted.

I'm relatively excited, and am going to try to study the objectives (although the email states that you really should go in cold on beta tests, but I'd rather pass than have to take this again at a cost of 232 dollars in 2008!)

Prometric said the test program lasts until the end of August and we can expect a 6-8 week delay. Part of me is hoping to fail so I can have all the disappointment of failing but without the instant buzzkill and feeling like I could have spent that much longer reviewing the guides...

matradley

Bob Kiwi wrote:

I'm signed up for 9AM Friday. Haven't heard from my three other coworkers that I referred to it, though I imagine they would tell me if they were accepted.

I'm relatively excited, and am going to try to study the objectives (although the email states that you really should go in cold on beta tests, but I'd rather pass than have to take this again at a cost of 232 dollars in 2008!)

Prometric said the test program lasts until the end of August and we can expect a 6-8 week delay. Part of me is hoping to fail so I can have all the disappointment of failing but without the instant buzzkill and feeling like I could have spent that much longer reviewing the guides...

You are crazy! :P

I did some research on the Colour Theory and gamut... I look forward to writing this exam on Wednesday, 8 August at 9:00 am. A couple co-workers are supposed to be going with me to write this one.

RegretThink

Just took the exam early today.

A few things that might help ya out.

The objectives of course are pretty general but the stuff inside the parenthesis are terms/objects you should know inside and out. A big portion of the test like it says on the objectives list concerns printers and their components so make sure you know what the components are and what their function is and what are the symptoms if those components fail. Tech support questions are pretty straight forward and common sense as long as you follow the rule that customers are to be respected. Also of course you should know the Laser Printer procedure INSIDE and OUT. I'm guessing that about 25 questions pertained to some aspect of it. Oh the test was 115 Questions Long and I was given 120 minutes to complete it, which was plenty of time I finished in about 35 min. or so. I'm sure I got atleast 90% of the questions right so unless the standards for this test are through the ROOF I will be looking forward to my PDI+ certificate in the mail. The questions in the last 10% I wasn't sure of because some of the questions to me were a little vague and the BEST answer didn't just come right out and say pick this one.

So in conclusion, Make sure you know
- the terms/concepts inside the parenthesis on the objectives list
- the laser printer procedural steps
- the difference between laser printer and printers that use ink and the steps they use
- brush up on your customer service
- the components that fail on printers/scanners and how they affect job output or how they stop jobs from completion
- how MFDs can fail and how to determine which which part is the culprit
- differentiate between application printer errors, driver printer errors, and hardware printer errors
- and make sure you have COMMON SENSE :P


Oh ya to those who took the test did you guys leave alot of comments about the questions?
And to those who havn't received their replies from CompTIA, try sending ANOTHER application but with the SAME code. I first applied on Thurs. July 26th and waited the 5 Business days and had no reply. So on Aug. 2nd I applied AGAIN with the SAME code and got a reply the same day . Literally 5 hours later. Well Good Luck to those taking the test hope we all become PDI+ :P

matradley

RegretThink wrote:

Just took the exam early today.

A few things that might help ya out.

The objectives of course are pretty general but the stuff inside the parenthesis are terms/objects you should know inside and out. A big portion of the test like it says on the objectives list concerns printers and their components so make sure you know what the components are and what their function is and what are the symptoms if those components fail. Tech support questions are pretty straight forward and common sense as long as you follow the rule that customers are to be respected. Also of course you should know the Laser Printer procedure INSIDE and OUT. I'm guessing that about 25 questions pertained to some aspect of it. Oh the test was 115 Questions Long and I was given 120 minutes to complete it, which was plenty of time I finished in about 35 min. or so. I'm sure I got atleast 90% of the questions right so unless the standards for this test are through the ROOF I will be looking forward to my PDI+ certificate in the mail. The questions in the last 10% I wasn't sure of because some of the questions to me were a little vague and the BEST answer didn't just come right out and say pick this one.

So in conclusion, Make sure you know
- the terms/concepts inside the parenthesis on the objectives list
- the laser printer procedural steps
- the difference between laser printer and printers that use ink and the steps they use
- brush up on your customer service
- the components that fail on printers/scanners and how they affect job output or how they stop jobs from completion
- how MFDs can fail and how to determine which which part is the culprit
- differentiate between application printer errors, driver printer errors, and hardware printer errors
- and make sure you have COMMON SENSE :P


Oh ya to those who took the test did you guys leave alot of comments about the questions?
And to those who havn't received their replies from CompTIA, try sending ANOTHER application but with the SAME code. I first applied on Thurs. July 26th and waited the 5 Business days and had no reply. So on Aug. 2nd I applied AGAIN with the SAME code and got a reply the same day . Literally 5 hours later. Well Good Luck to those taking the test hope we all become PDI+ :P

Thanks for the advice. Regardless of what CompTIA asked, I have been going through my notes and books on printers - especially laser. I hope that all of us BETA testers will be able to benefit from this certification.

RegretThink

matradley wrote:

Thanks for the advice. Regardless of what CompTIA asked, I have been going through my notes and books on printers - especially laser. I hope that all of us BETA testers will be able to benefit from this certification.

Well if you have any of the OLD A+ books for the A+ Core Hardware exams (pre 2006 update) read up on the printer and scanner sections there. Although not complete they cover about 85% of what you need to know for this test.

JDMurray

There is also a lot of excellent information on the technologies covered by the PDI+ exam at http://home.howstuffworks.com

Ricka182

I just got approved to take this. I'm taking mine the 22nd, which is the last day to do it. I want to have as much time as possible to go over whatever notes I have, and can find. Hopefully, I'll be able to add this to my list.......

matradley

I did the exam today. It was not too difficult. I found some questions that were on the exam about some of the parts of a laser printer that I did not recognized. Overall, it was a great exam and I left comments on some of the questions.

matradley

Other than going to your exam provider to see your exam, where else can you keep track of your exam to determine if you have passed or failed?

JDMurray

You can log into your account on certify.comptia.org to check the status of all your CompTIA certifications at anytime. However, your testing provider will usually have the score available online before CompTIA will. And because this is a beta test the scores might not be made public for several months.

matradley

JDMurray wrote:

You can log into your account on certify.comptia.org to check the status of all your CompTIA certifications at anytime. However, your testing provider will usually have the score available online before CompTIA will. And because this is a beta test the scores might not be made public for several months.

Ah, sounds good. Thanks for your help.