MCSE or CCNA

vsama001

Which one is easy to pass?? CCNA or MCSE

mamono

Neither, they are only as easy as how strong your resolve and determination.

Daniel333

Wow, that is like the saddest first post ever. How about your career goals? History? Likes and dislikes?

Desktops and server stuff
http://www.microsoft.com/learning/mcp/mcse/windows2003/default.mspx

Networking
http://www.cisco.com/web/learning/le3/le2/le0/le9/learning_certification_type_home.html

The MCSE takes a lot more work than CCNA. But the MCSE is being phased out. The CCNA leads to professional level certs like CCNP as well as many specializations in security, voice etc.

darkerosxx

Daniel333 wrote:

Wow, that is like the saddest first post ever. .

QFT

/usr

Which one is easy to pass?? CCNA or MCSE

Neither one is easy to pass and both require a lot of dedication.

BigPoppaRP

Daniel333 wrote:

Wow, that is like the saddest first post ever. How about your career goals? History? Likes and dislikes?

Desktops and server stuff
http://www.microsoft.com/learning/mcp/mcse/windows2003/default.mspx

Networking
http://www.cisco.com/web/learning/le3/le2/le0/le9/learning_certification_type_home.html

The MCSE takes a lot more work than CCNA. But the MCSE is being phased out. The CCNA leads to professional level certs like CCNP as well as many specializations in security, voice etc.

MCSE being Phases out? Is there an article some where?

dynamik

They had to let MCSE go because some countries (*cough* *cough* Canada *cough*) didn't like the use of "Engineer". The 2003 MCSE is the last one. The new certifications are MS Certified Technical Specialist (MCTS) and MS Certified IT Pro (MCITP).

averyjas

Does Canada like the use of the word 'Imagineer' instead? I guess it would be 'MCSI' for them right?

arwes

averyjas wrote:

Does Canada like the use of the word 'Imagineer' instead? I guess it would be 'MCSI' for them right?

Sounds like the beginning of a new series for CBS!

ilcram19-2

ccna is just one test or 2 at the most
mcse is about five test and it not including electives

dynamik

ilcram19-2 wrote:

ccna is just one test or 2 at the most
mcse is about five test and it not including electives

You need a minimum of seven for an MCSE, but that's not the point. The content of the tests is very different, and you can't just compare them by the number of tests.

networker050184

Which one is harder depends on the person.

To me the CCNA is pretty easy, but MS exams would not be easy at all for me.

Kaminsky

ilcram19-2 wrote:

ccna is just one test or 2 at the most

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA !

That's funny.. Many MCSE's fall flat on their faces when they are feeling cocky and go for the ccna.

HEHEHEHEHEH !


made me chuckle that one.

Do you want to do networking or do you want to head for the lower end of the market and go for looking after servers.

All due respect to windows admins.. I was one for an 8,500 user acute hospital for 5 years (I used to be the PC support manager there for 3 years before that) but the money in that has a ceiling. Networking money only gets better and is, I would say, the only way to get past £25k

I moved on to Comms manager in a huge data center and I have 4 other smaller DCs under my control as well. One of my senior bosses is ccnp, ccdp, ccsp, ccie (in the #9k area) and several other certs. I was joking with him saying I bet your on about £300k.... he said he wouldnt get out of bed for that and I honestly didn't know if he was joking or not!

bjaxx

dynamik wrote:

They had to let MCSE go because some countries (*cough* *cough* Canada *cough*) didn't like the use of "Engineer". The 2003 MCSE is the last one. The new certifications are MS Certified Technical Specialist (MCTS) and MS Certified IT Pro (MCITP).

I agree though, the term engineer shouldn't be used lightly.

Essendon

vsama001 wrote:

Which one is easy to pass?? CCNA or MCSE

What tastes better, beer or bourbon??

dynamik

Essendon wrote:

vsama001 wrote:

Which one is easy to pass?? CCNA or MCSE

What tastes better, beer or bourbon??

Beer with a shot or two or bourbon in it. Are you saying he should do both?

Essendon

Not sure how beer would taste mixed with bourbon. The other day I tasted Guiness mixed with Black Label, and I swear I wanted to quit drinking forever...

wat08

dynamik wrote:

They had to let MCSE go because some countries (*cough* *cough* Canada *cough*) didn't like the use of "Engineer".

Can you elaborate on this? Is there a link you can refer me to?

dynamik

Essendon: There are good and bad combinations. You can't just be careless with it

Wat08: http://www.engineerscanada.ca/e/pub_news_02_03.cfm

msnelgrove

here is an article from Microsoft about MCSE's in Quebec http://www.microsoft.com/canada/learning/QuebecMCSE/default.mspx you can use MCSE but you cannot use Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer. The other provinces do not like MCSE's calling themselves engineers but they recognize that it is an international certification and do not want to discredit it.

nel

vsama001 wrote:

Which one is easy to pass?? CCNA or MCSE

IMO niether, Both take dedication and hard work. i say go for both.

JockVSJock

I was wondering about doing one of these. I will knock out my Linux+ here in the next few days.

Right now I'm in a Help Desk type role, however I want to expand out to either a networking and/or sys admin type role.

Which one would fit me better?

thanks

nel

JockVSJock wrote:

I was wondering about doing one of these. I will knock out my Linux+ here in the next few days.

Right now I'm in a Help Desk type role, however I want to expand out to either a networking and/or sys admin type role.

Which one would fit me better?

thanks

MCSE is more for a windows sys admin and ccna is for cisco networking but it is an entry level cert. Its usually good to gain both at some point but obviously each cert focuses on its companies products.

vsmith3rd

Daniel333 wrote:

Wow, that is like the saddest first post ever. How about your career goals? History? Likes and dislikes?

Wow. That comment made me want to revisit my first post. As a first post, that did leave something to be desired.

sprkymrk

Kaminsky wrote:

ilcram19-2 wrote:

ccna is just one test or 2 at the most

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA !

That's funny.. Many MCSE's fall flat on their faces when they are feeling cocky and go for the ccna.

HEHEHEHEHEH !


made me chuckle that one.

Do you want to do networking or do you want to head for the lower end of the market and go for looking after servers.

All due respect to windows admins..

Uh yeah, all due respect to you as well.....

vsmith3rd

Kaminsky wrote:

Do you want to do networking or do you want to head for the lower end of the market and go for looking after servers.

I guess that means I'm currently headed for the "lower end"

Slowhand

Kaminsky wrote:

ilcram19-2 wrote:

ccna is just one test or 2 at the most

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA !

That's funny.. Many MCSE's fall flat on their faces when they are feeling cocky and go for the ccna.

HEHEHEHEHEH !


made me chuckle that one.

Do you want to do networking or do you want to head for the lower end of the market and go for looking after servers.

All due respect to windows admins.. I was one for an 8,500 user acute hospital for 5 years (I used to be the PC support manager there for 3 years before that) but the money in that has a ceiling. Networking money only gets better and is, I would say, the only way to get past £25k

I moved on to Comms manager in a huge data center and I have 4 other smaller DCs under my control as well. One of my senior bosses is ccnp, ccdp, ccsp, ccie (in the #9k area) and several other certs. I was joking with him saying I bet your on about £300k.... he said he wouldnt get out of bed for that and I honestly didn't know if he was joking or not!

I'm not sure exactly what your experiences have been like, but you're comparing apples to oranges. Yes, most people find the CCNA exam(s) very difficult, mainly because we don't work with the Cisco IOS CLI on a daily basis and these concepts can seem very abstract to most of us. However, there are plenty of networking guys that find the MCSE exams very difficult, especially when they underestimate them coming in. There's also the fact that the CCNA is an entry-level certification, so it's not as difficult as the exams your boss has passed. I would agree, a CCIE probably doesn't have too much interest in managing Windows servers, why would he/she? There's pleny to do when you're working at the expert-level in any field. CCIEs won't want to spend their time managing servers at their workplace, MCAs won't want to configure routers, and LPIC-3s won't want to be working with Windows or networking equipment. They'll want to be working with what they specialize in.

Comparing Microsoft and Cisco certs is definitely not black and white. Saying one is harder, one is better, is like trying to do the same with physics and chemistry. I find physics easier to grasp than chemistry, but that doesn't mean that I think Stephen Hawking is dumber (or smarter) than Gerhard Ertl.

JockVSJock

Its funny, you hear about the MCSE all of the time, however, you never hear about the MCSA, why is that?

Is there no demand for the MCSA?

Slowhand

JockVSJock wrote:

Its funny, you hear about the MCSE all of the time, however, you never hear about the MCSA, why is that?

Is there no demand for the MCSA?

The MCSE certification has been around longer and has gained "buzz-word" noteriaty in the industry. The MCSA, like many certifications, is excellent for showing that you have the knowledge the exams test you on, but it won't be as well-known as the MCSE, CCNA, CISSP, A+, RHCE, etc. Ever heard of Convergence+, CAP, or SCSA? Most people haven't, but they're still valuable certifications that show a great breadth of knowledge and training. (And, while most HR managers won't know what they are, a good IT manager or CIO will recognize what these certs represent when they hear and/or read about them.)