what's the next "I passed" trend for TE?

Mike-Mike

obviously there was a ton of postings about the CompTIA trinity towards the end of the year... I'm sure that will die down now that it's no longer lifetime....

any expect any trends?

I'm predicting 70-680... I know that's my next course at school....

ehnde

I don't see 70-680 turning into a trend, it's just too friggin hard. (was for me). I'm still recovering from the sacrifice of the hours I put in for that exam! We probably won't see any trend like the CompTIA trifecta for quite some time.......

erpadmin

Mike-Mike wrote: »

I'm predicting 70-680... I know that's my next course at school....

I won't be taking the 680 for months, though my goal is to have all 5 EA exams completed by the summer. The latest will be end of the year. But that's my last EA exam, though. By then, I'm hoping Professor Messer is done with the 70-680 videos...

xenodamus

I think there will be alot of MCITP action going on now that alot have finished all the CompTIA exams that they care to. I plan to be a M$ fanboy this coming year. I have alot of outside areas that I want to branch off into and study, but I need a solid M$ server foundation first.

Cisco Inferno

xenodamus wrote: »

I plan to be a M$ fanboy this coming year.

Same here i plan on being the ill M$ fanboy as well....till june 30th

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hoping to take 271, 272, and 680 in that time frame.

steve13ad

Unless Comptia removes the Lifetime moniker from anymore of their certs, I'll be all MS this year. Shooting for the MCDST before it retires, and then the MCSA (/S if it works out).

If I get a little froggie, I may make a run at the ITIL Foundations.

Mike-Mike

Cisco Inferno wrote: »

Same here i plan on being the ill M$ fanboy as well....till june 30th

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same here... then I may hit up the CCNA

TheSuperRuski

Mike-Mike wrote: »

same here... then I may hit up the CCNA

It seems MS will be on fire next year, well tomorrow . I have to get my 680 before CCNA and enrolling into WGU. I see I'm going to have a lot of company in the Microsoft threads.

chrisone

Next trend will be the new CCNP Security.

veritas_libertas

chrisone wrote: »

Next trend will be the new CCNP Security.

LOL, we will see about that. CCSP was not all that popular and I believe part of the problem was the cost of picking up equipment to prepare for the exam.

MentholMoose

There seems to be a lot more activity in the Linux forums, so maybe RHCE or the "new" RHCSA will be a new trend. No doubt in absolutely terms there will be less people getting them than, say, MS exams, but it seems to be a high growth area. Once some RHCE on RHEL6 study material is available, I will get started on it.

Besides that, I think the MCSE exam retirement dates might be announced in 2011, so there may be a spike due to people trying to finish it before it's too late. I still have two exams to knock out. Lastly, if vSphere 5 gets released in 2011, I'd expect VMware to do something like they did with the VCP 4 (they let people with the VCP 3 do the VCP 4 without taking more training, for a limited time), which would cause a spike in VCP 5 pursuers (myself included).

Chris:/*

I do not think VMware 5 will be coming for at least another 2 years.

tomahawkeer

70-680 is next on my hit list. I haven't went over a lot of it yet, but why is everyone saying its so hard? Ive been using Windows 7 for almost a year now, it shouldn't be that difficult?

TheSuperRuski

tomahawkeer wrote: »

70-680 is next on my hit list. I haven't went over a lot of it yet, but why is everyone saying its so hard? Ive been using Windows 7 for almost a year now, it shouldn't be that difficult?

680 isn't a user experience heavy exam. By that i mean just owning windows 7 wouldn't be enough to pass that exam. You have to know different operations inside and out. No more "Well A, B,and C are obviously wrong" its more like "well A, B, and C could be right. But in this particular scenarios B is the MOST perfect answer"

As a tech and user of windows 7 I can say topics like finding drivers, Installing, Migrating or adding wireless networks seem extremely simply to me because I have done it so many times . But configuring Branch cache, knowing the deployment commands by heart, and mobile computing are brand new to me and I have used Win7 for over 6 months and worked with it in the field.

Zentraedi

I really don't get all the "70-680 is so hard" commotion. The exam itself was pretty rote and nothing too complex.

On the other hand, I thought the 70-642 was a bit of a challenge and barely squeaked by....even though I did well on my CCNA exams. I have no idea why people on the forum seem to be of the impression that the 642 is one of the easier exams. :

erpadmin

Zentraedi wrote: »

On the other hand, I thought the 70-642 was a bit of a challenge and barely squeaked by....even though I did well on my CCNA exams. I have no idea why people on the forum seem to be of the impression that the 642 is one of the easier exams. :

Sometime, hopefully soon, I will state my opinion on 642, one way or the other. I haven't taken it yet, but that is the first of the five exams I'm taken, with 680 being the last.

What did you use to study for the 642 that barely got you by?

eansdad

My guess would be an M$ exam (680) or MCITP:SA/EA or maybe just Linux+

TheSuperRuski

Zentraedi wrote: »

I really don't get all the "70-680 is so hard" commotion. The exam itself was pretty rote and nothing too complex.

On the other hand, I thought the 70-642 was a bit of a challenge and barely squeaked by....even though I did well on my CCNA exams. I have no idea why people on the forum seem to be of the impression that the 642 is one of the easier exams. :

I think its all based on personal experience to be honest. Some topics are just harder or easier than they are for others. Also, study ethic, study materials, experience and the like come into play. Maybe a lot of people under estimated the 680. I can't say because i haven't sat for it yet but will soon.

N2IT

Mike I think you'll see a lot more Microsoft exams taken this year. I know I am eyeing down 70-680 and the MCSA.

I am going to focus more on labbing and doing, than reading this year. I went crazy and read a ton.

za3bour

I think we will see a lot of MCITP exams especially 70-680

Dr IT

well i think 70 - 680 is the deal but mostly MS ( with the new range of certs ) and i can sadly see less traffic in to the Comptia Sections

Zentraedi

erpadmin wrote: »

Sometime, hopefully soon, I will state my opinion on 642, one way or the other. I haven't taken it yet, but that is the first of the five exams I'm taken, with 680 being the last.

What did you use to study for the 642 that barely got you by?

I spent 3 weeks watching CBT Nuggets, plus reading the MS Press, Sybex and Exam Cram books. I also did the practice exams from each book. Basic network addressing was no problem, but I felt that I didn't have enough exposure to DNS, IPSec, RRAS, NAP and File/Print services.

I suppose the key was actually implementing that stuff in labs, but so much of it was dependent on several settings being setup or preconfigured just right...especially VPN. With DNS, it didn't really sink in until I took a few practice exams. I'm still confused about IPSec and NAP. For file/print services, I was a little too overconfident, skimmed the material and missed many of the details.

If I had taken another week, I could have done better, but I've already passed and it's not like I can retake the exam for a higher score.

One thing I noticed though, is that the exam referenced material for other exams and that threw me off a bit. Right now, I'm studying for the 640 and it feels like I should have done this first.

jmritenour

Chris:/* wrote: »

I do not think VMware 5 will be coming for at least another 2 years.

I agree - 4 has only been out about a year and a half, and they just had the first major point release last summer. I really don't see a vSphere/ESXi 5 coming until 2012 at the earliest.

That's not to say, however, that the point releases in between won't be major game changers, and the exam will probably be re-worked a couple of times in between to accommodate that. Especially since ESX will be phased out in the process.