ACHDS (Apple Certified Help Desk Specialist)...

Has anyone gone to one of Apple's trainings for ACHDS (Specifically, MacOS 101: Mac OS X Support Essentials v10.4). They're pretty expensive and only offered in certain places around the country.

For us to send our PC tech to 2-day ACHDS training is going to cost $200 for a plane ticket to Cupertino or Chicago, $1500 for the course, $150 for the exam, plus a rental car and $300 for hotels for 3 days.

Does anyone think this is worth it?

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Comments

nel

personally no.

but if your an all apple shop and you will actually get something out of it then yes, possibly. but then again most courses are priced around that range

can you not purchase books for it like you can for the mcdst?

dynamik

I don't think so either unless you have a specific business purpose for it. Are you guys a mac repair shop?

hypnotoad

Nope we're a school - we have about 20 Macs (G5, iMacs, and an XServe/XRaid) in one of our labs).

dynamik

If it's just for managing your own stuff, I wouldn't worry about it. There isn't going to be any difference with how you handle the hardware, and any installation and/or configuration information can be found on the internet or in written resources.

sthomas

In my opinion it is not worth that price. If you want the certification I think it would be more benefical to just pick up a book on Mac OS X/Apple hardware and play around with a couple of spare Macs.

TechJunky

Essentials is just desktop user interaction with the server, no Server learning really. I have taken and passed the 10.5 essentials and went to a training.

I would spend my money on the Advanced System Administration session or the Open Directory Session's towards the ACSA. I actually took the Open/Active Directory session and then quit contracting for Apple so I didn't take the test. However, INSANE amounts of information. Better than ANY unix training session I have ever been to. They explain how Kerebos works, what it is, how the keys are held etc.

I think it would be of great value to any windows server guy who really thinks he knows LDAP and AD... You would be blown away, 100% garanteed.

azjag

I'm doing it to branch out a little more. I've scheduled the 9L0-403 Mac OS X support essentials exam for the end of December. Got the book (cheapest place is amazon that i have found so far. $51) and hopefully I'll win the mac mini on ebay. Use that for my test bed. It's also time to update the Sticky for the Apple page. I'll start putting that together too.

Daniel333

Lynda.com has some pretty fun training on MacOS and MacOS server. Maybe get those a pick up a few "Test" Macs and you're probably fine for training.

Hyper-Me

dynamik wrote: »

any installation and/or configuration information can be found on the internet or in written resources.

I guess you havnt dealt with Mac OSX that much

Its hard to find documentation for anything, most google searches end up with some random forum post where someone describes the problem but noone has an answer. The Apple KB is generally terrible.

Not only that, but Apple certs are pretty laughable in the industry. We have thousands where I work and the only reason we have any Apple certified staff is because you HAVE to have ACMT's to order warranty parts in-house.

dynamik

Hyper-Me wrote: »

I guess you havnt dealt with Mac OSX that much

Yea, only a little over three years with our design department on our domain...

Hyper-Me

dynamik wrote: »

Yea, only a little over three years with our design department on our domain...

Took a new job 2 months ago and already been there 3 years. Thats impressive.

dynamik

Hyper-Me wrote: »

Took a new job 2 months ago and already been there 3 years. Thats impressive.

No, what's impressive are your deductive reasoning abilities. I'm just surprised you didn't take it one step further and realize that a new job implies that I had an old job...

Hyper-Me

What I can deduce is that if you worked for a new company then it wouldnt be "our" design team or "our" domain any longer.

dynamik

Hyper-Me wrote: »

What I can deduce is that if you worked for a new company then it wouldnt be "our" design team or "our" domain any longer.

Unless I still work with them on the side...

Hyper-Me

dynamik wrote: »

Unless I still work with them on the side...

J/K. You are far too easy to get going.