Whats a good estimate on how long it should take to get MCITP:SA?

Goodafternoon everyone,

I willbe going to a community college starting in January to help pursue and studyfor some certs and wanted to get your opinion on something. How long doesit usually take someone with little or no experience to get their MCITP:SA? I asked because they have a path where they are teaching you (classroomand lab setting) each of the courses for the MCITP:SA cert. Eachcourse covers 1 cert (windows config is the first course) and the classes are asemester in length. So going this route will last pretty much 2 years (Fall,Spring, Summer, Fall and finish in Spring).

I waslooking at this route since I would be new to some of the material (probablynot the Windwos 7 stuff but everything dealing with the servers would be new)and will have a chance to have someone knowledgeable to work with along withclassmates and the overall classroom structure would be better for me. I am notnew to computers as i upgrade and work on them often but my current job is moresoftware/technical support and I am looking to get into a actual IT role.

I amfinishing up studying for my A+ and will take that by the end of the year. I will then be starting in January at the community college for my CCNA (will be done in June with that cert), and was looking to start with the1 cert in the path for MCITP:SA.

Whatdo you guys think? Whats the average time frame to get this cert? Is this entirely too long, does it seem resaonable? Thanks for youradvice.

Greg

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Comments

Jack2

Have you looked at going to WGU.EDU as an option? You would be working towards an BS and you could obtain the MCITP with the needed classes. They also give you credit for many IT certs that are less than 5 years old.

Good luck on you certification progress!

powerfool

There are many dedicated people that will do an exam each month, if they have a little experience and dedicate the time to studying... A decent timeframe might be two months for each exam without experience if you are highly motivated. Do you look at WGU, as mentioned.

gcarroll357

Thanks guys.... I have looked at my WGU but since I already have my Bachelors in MIS I was looking at their masters. I didnt really want to spend that type of money if I didnt have to and figured this would be a better way to learn the information, get the cert and not spend as much money. Thank you the suggestion though.

Powefool, so you are saying that with little or no experience it would only take someone about two months to use materials/setups to learn each of the neccesary information for each of the certs in the MCITP:SA? Thats a big difference (1 year compare to 2)....thanks again.

saspro

Do you have any Microsoft experience?
I did mine in about 4 weeks but I was an MCSE before I started it so I did all the MCTS requirements in one upgrade exam.

An exam a month isn't unrealistic if you've got the spare time.

powerfool

gcarroll357 wrote: »

Powefool, so you are saying that with little or no experience it would only take someone about two months to use materials/setups to learn each of the neccesary information for each of the certs in the MCITP:SA? Thats a big difference (1 year compare to 2)....thanks again.

MCITP SA is only four exams... Windows Vista or 7, AD, and Networking(?) plus the SA Pro exam... at two months per exam... that is only eight months... where do you come up with comparing 1-year vs. 2-years?

gcarroll357

saspro wrote: »

Do you have any Microsoft experience?
I did mine in about 4 weeks but I was an MCSE before I started it so I did all the MCTS requirements in one upgrade exam.

An exam a month isn't unrealistic if you've got the spare time.

Thanks for the response. I outside using Windows XP and 7 for daily use, no. I currently do not have any certs as A+ will be my first then CCNA then Microsoft. Thanks for the response, I didnt think that it could be done in such little time, though I did think that going that way was a longer path

gcarroll357

powerfool wrote: »

MCITP SA is only four exams... Windows Vista or 7, AD, and Networking(?) plus the SA Pro exam... at two months per exam... that is only eight months... where do you come up with comparing 1-year vs. 2-years?

Its only 4? I thought it was five. I was thinking it was 5 (thats how they have it broken down where after each sesmter you are ready to take that cert that you were prepping for and at the end of the 5 semesters you would have the MCITP...maybe I misunderstood the semesters). With me thinking it was 5 exams I was thinking about 2 months per exam and knowing myself i would take probably take little bit longer then 2 months for at least one of the exams. And I got 2 years because they stated you start in the Fall semester, then you are going year around til the next Spring semester which is two years (start Fall 2012 and end Spring 2014.

Again, thanks for your insight.

powerfool

If you are looking at WGU, it isn't a normal model. It is self-paced... once you get done with one class, you can move onto another. If you do all of your courses in one semester, that is it. Check out the threads on it in the stickies.

pham0329

powerfool wrote: »

MCITP SA is only four exams... Windows Vista or 7, AD, and Networking(?) plus the SA Pro exam... at two months per exam... that is only eight months... where do you come up with comparing 1-year vs. 2-years?

MCITP: SA is only 3 exams. The 640, 642, and 646.

If you worked with Microsoft products in the past, you can probably knock out the 640 and 646 in a month. The 642 may take one month in itself...

Armann

I would say one a month is really pushing it if you have no experience. What you really need is hands on experience. But I guess if you study really hard you can do it in three months, then I'm talking about a person that has little experience as a Windows server administrator.

gcarroll357

Thanks Armann for the reply. I currently do not have any server experience. I was love to get some hands on experience but my current job does not have any for me to test/play so I was looking to work on this cert so I can get some kind of experience.

TLeTourneau

I'd recommend 642 first, then 640 and finally 646. There is some crossover between 642 and 640 and I think if you do 642 first it makes 640 a bit easier to understand. That, of course, is just my opinion.