Reviews, critiques and what to expect.

RussS

Well three weeks of intense study has certainly made me wonder why I tried this with so little study material. I have booked the exam for next Wednesday so I will be cramming big-time over the next week to bone up on where I am slightly fragile.
For study material I have used the Learnkey CBTs and the Syngress Security+ book for my main study sources. Unfortunately I would not recommend the Syngress book at all - the DVD that accompanies it is virtually worthless and I find the book very difficult to follow. It may just be me, but I have borrowed Syngress books from the library for other certs and find that they are all not my cup of tea. From previews of the Sybex book and a couple pages sent to me to view from the Mike Meyers Passport series I would rate either of them as much more suitable.
On the Sybex site you can download a couple sample chapters from their book to get a feel for it.
I supplimented my study with an excellent PDF authored by Tcat Howser and Helen O'Boyle - http://www.alphageekproductions.com/
I heartily recommend it and suggest that you download the Ebook for only $20.00 - they also have a neat referral scheme (NOPE, I am not using that or involved with it in any way) that enables you to get generous credits.

I have been fortunate enough to obtain a couple practice tests to suppliment the questions I wrote a couple weeks back and it looks like I am in the ball park with my material, however I have come across a few errors on the Boson tests where the exact same question comes up a couple times with different answers. I have also come across questions dealing with subject matter I have not extensively read up on - such as RAID 6/7/10/50/53 *gulp*
For those studying for this exam I would recommend boning up on IEEE 802.s, Standard Ports + a few needed for Kerberos & SSH/HTTPS, cabling standards, and the OSI 7 layer model. These items were briefly covered in the Syngress book, but appear a lot in the various testers I have obtained. Geez I hate that stuff ... lol
I have also been sent a really neat site for boning up on certain Security related terms and acronyms ...
http://www.itsecurity.com/dictionary/dictionary.htm

odurasler

Let us know what you think with the LearnKey CDroms!

bellboy

have you been to tcat's website? he offers various freebies and extracts from his books there or at the security+ forum on examnotes where he is the moderator.

RussS

Hey odurasler

Well unlike the A+ and Net+ by Mike Meyers I don't think I could pass the exam on them alone. I do however think they are very informative and as long as you can get past the big GI type dood with the very gentle presentation voice they are not too bad. There are one or two production hickups where a certain word was voiced over and a couple volume glitches, but other than that not bad at all

Hey Bellboy

Yes I sure have - I downloaded Tcats and the pdf back in September and that and the Learnkey CBT were the basis for the questions I wrote a couple weeks back. After finishing those I started to read the Syngress book and I have now obtained the Boson, Beachfront and Preplogic quizzers so I have a few more resources.
Luckily yesterday the Mike Meyers Passport Sec+ book penned by Trevor Kay turned up so I can study that over the weekend before my exam.

bellboy

sounds like you got your work cut out, but you've always given the impression that you have a good understanding of most things, so you stand a pretty good chance.

best of luck.

odurasler

Russ,

Thanks for the input. I'm also looking to buy a security+ book. It seems you have read a couple. What would you suggest :

Webmaster

Sybex has send me a review copy of their Security+ study guide Russ mentioned. I haven't read it yet, but I will post the review in a future section on our site. Here's the link to the book, the first three chapters can be downloaded for free in PDF format: www.sybex.com/sybexbooks.nsf/Booklist/4098

Johan

RussS

From the 4 sample chapters I downloaded it appears the Sybex book is one of the better ones.
With all honesty I haven't read the Passport series book yet and just browsed through it. I am about to start it in earnest this morning. I am personally not comfortable with the format of the passport series and prefer a true technical style of writing. However I will attempt an impartial review of the book after the weekend.