70-291 Scheduled!

Agent6376

Hello all,

I've been studying for 70-291 for the last three weeks to a month and I feel like I'm ready to challenge the beast. This is my first time taking the exam, but I went ahead and used the Microsoft Second Shot just in case it bests me. The exam is scheduled for Saturday 5/02 at 9AM.

Wish me luck!
A+/Net+ Pass
70-270 Pass
70-290 Pass
70-291 ??
Profit=MCSA
Fail=eh...Fail

bikeandski

Good luck! I hope to be taking this exam soon as well.... If my work load slows up anyway! I'm buried migrating servers off-site to a datacenter.

bertieb

Good luck

Super99

Good luck Agent.
Let us know how you do on 291.
I'm studying for the 290 test. What's the 290 test like compared to 270?

Andretii

Best of luck

I will schedule this for next Friday

Agent6376

Super99 wrote: »

Good luck Agent.
Let us know how you do on 291.
I'm studying for the 290 test. What's the 290 test like compared to 270?

270 was a walk in the park from what I can remember. I used Transcender primarily, and I learned most of the things I know operating on Windows XP machines. I had a very good summary of what Windows XP could do before studying for the exam, and I passed it with flying colors.

So, to answer the question: 290 Had a lot of new topics that I had never covered before, but I picked up on them pretty easily. Make sure you really understand permissions, AD (to the extent of the scope that 290 presents), GPOs, SUS, etc. I studied for that exam for about 3 weeks using Testout material and I passed with an 856. Look for the "Microsoft" answer. There's no such thing as 3rd party applications (because Microsoft is perfect ofc), and chances are if you're given the choice between manually configuring something or running a wizard-the wizard is the correct way to go.

Sbrito

Goodluck! I start studying for the test monday(gonna enjoy the weekend)

Agent6376

**UPDATE** Passed this morning with an 857! The beast is no more!

Such a huge relief that this is behind me. I plan on finishing the MCSE track with a specialty in Messaging, but I'm going straight into 70-293 now.

To future 70-291 takers, let me try to make studying a bit easier (and not by giving away answers.)

A couple of things to note, and these may already be no brainers:
1. (I really belive this is the most important one) When you're doing practice questions, dont focus on remembering the answers for specific questions. Make sure you're looking at WHY that answer is what it is. Even if you know what the answer is, look at the incorrect answers. Why wont the incorrect answers work? I say this because on this exam there were very few "gimme" questions where I knew right off the bat exactly what the answer was. I found myself in the same situtation as when I was taking the practice exams: Why wont these other answers work?

2. Know the basics and know the details equally. It's great to know the theory behind things, DNS in particular. When would you use stub zones as opposed to conditional forwarding? What types of zones are authorative? As for details: LOGGING. How do you log DNS events? Where are these logs located? If you're using command line, what are the switches used?

3. Get a very good understanding of your common counters, and the different utilites at your disposal. What's the difference between System Monitor and Counters/Trace logs? When would you use one over the other?

4. Services are important to not skimp out on. You need to have a basic understanding of what the different services do (as it pertains to server or network administraton). Also, make sure you know your services recovery options.

5. Make educated guesses on questions that you don't know. The more you know about those known wrong answers, the better. Being able to rule out one or more obvious wrong answers helps tremendiously.

6. I can't belive I'm going to say this, but know what tools are available in task manager as well. I was at a loss when I was asked questions about using task manager in ways that I had not previously done or studied.

Study Materials Used: Testout MCSE, Transcender, www.techexams.net

Good luck to you all!

RomBUS

Agent6376 wrote: »

**UPDATE** Passed this morning with an 857! The beast is no more!

Such a huge relief that this is behind me. I plan on finishing the MCSE track with a specialty in Messaging, but I'm going straight into 70-293 now.

To future 70-291 takers, let me try to make studying a bit easier (and not by giving away answers.)

A couple of things to note, and these may already be no brainers:
1. (I really belive this is the most important one) When you're doing practice questions, dont focus on remembering the answers for specific questions. Make sure you're looking at WHY that answer is what it is. Even if you know what the answer is, look at the incorrect answers. Why wont the incorrect answers work? I say this because on this exam there were very few "gimme" questions where I knew right off the bat exactly what the answer was. I found myself in the same situtation as when I was taking the practice exams: Why wont these other answers work?

2. Know the basics and know the details equally. It's great to know the theory behind things, DNS in particular. When would you use stub zones as opposed to conditional forwarding? What types of zones are authorative? As for details: LOGGING. How do you log DNS events? Where are these logs located? If you're using command line, what are the switches used?

3. Get a very good understanding of your common counters, and the different utilites at your disposal. What's the difference between System Monitor and Counters/Trace logs? When would you use one over the other?

4. Services are important to not skimp out on. You need to have a basic understanding of what the different services do (as it pertains to server or network administraton). Also, make sure you know your services recovery options.

5. Make educated guesses on questions that you don't know. The more you know about those known wrong answers, the better. Being able to rule out one or more obvious wrong answers helps tremendiously.

6. I can't belive I'm going to say this, but know what tools are available in task manager as well. I was at a loss when I was asked questions about using task manager in ways that I had not previously done or studied.

Study Materials Used: Testout MCSE, Transcender, www.techexams.net

Good luck to you all!

Wow this is a good mini guide for me right here as I am taking this exam either next week or the week after

Congrats on the pass man!

impelse

Congrats

mikedisd2

CONGRATS!! Such great score for only a month's studying. Thanks for the study tips, this has to be the most crucial exam in the series for system administration.

Did you find already having the Net+ helpful for your studying?

Agent6376

mikedisd2 wrote: »

CONGRATS!! Such great score for only a month's studying. Thanks for the study tips, this has to be the most crucial exam in the series for system administration.

Did you find already having the Net+ helpful for your studying?

To be perfectly honest I took Net+ about a year ago and I really didn't know the material all that well. I had to dedicate almost two days (8 hrs each day) to fully understand subnetting. Net+ included the very basics of TCP/IP and some lessons of protocols, whereas this exam makes you dive head first into DNS and RRAS-each of which have TONS of information to take in.

Take your time and learn the material, and you should pass it first shot.