Should I Move My CISSP Exam?

spena

My exam is in 4 days but I'm wonder if I should reschedule *again* in 1-2 weeks to get better prepared?

Brief background on studying for cissp, On Sept 2012 my sponsor help take a course on CISSP Preparation at a local university. The program was 4 months long and classes were once a week. I passed all exams (tho not flying colours tho) and I original planned to the exam after Dec holidays. Unfortunately I slacked off and did not prepare at all, so I pushed it to Feb 12.

For the past 2.5 weeks, I've been studying 2-4 hours after work and ~6 hours on the weekends by rereading Shon Harris' book and doing her and Krutz/Vines CISSP Prep Guide's quizzes. But I have yet to take CCCure's tests.

In the next 2 days should I take CCCure's test and if I score less than 70%, reschedule my exam?

cyberguypr

Take cccure ASAP to see where you stand. Assuming you haven't done their questions before this should give you a good indication of where you stand. What is your background? Do you have any InfoSec experience?

spena

cyberguypr wrote: »

Take cccure ASAP to see where you stand. Assuming you haven't done their questions before this should give you a good indication of where you stand. What is your background? Do you have any InfoSec experience?

I still have 2 domains to finish rereading then I will take cccure exam, hopefully by tommorow.

I work been working under Access Control for 2 years, prior to that I was a univ student. So I will be taking IC2 Associate path until I am eligiable for the certification.

bobloblaw

Take the cccure exam now to gauge your knowledge. Rereading at this point will make a small difference, if any. A comprehensive quiz should give you a good idea on whether you know it or not, and weak points you need to work on.

Also, there's no way I'd drop $600 on a test where I'm getting an overall 70% on a full prep quiz.

emerald_octane

I was getting 60-65% on many of the domains in CCCure but I still bagged the test. The format is way different then the test and some (but not all) of the concepts are outdated. I know it's not cheap but you just need to get it done or it sounds like you will never take it. Move it one last time but make sure you actually use the extra two weeks given so you can feel confident. Trust me if you're going through flash cards or material every day for 4-6 hours you will start to leak CBK material and recite it in your sleep. Don't just quiz though, reread the chapters, watch some videos, hit it from all angles.

spena

Thanks for the feedback! I rescheduled my exam for another 10 days. Doing the sample quizes in cccure destroyed my what little confidence I had. In the mean time i'll pick up Conrad's 11th Hour CISSP Study Guide

kashmo

emerald_octane wrote: »

I was getting 60-65% on many of the domains in CCCure but I still bagged the test. The format is way different then the test and some (but not all) of the concepts are outdated. I know it's not cheap but you just need to get it done or it sounds like you will never take it. Move it one last time but make sure you actually use the extra two weeks given so you can feel confident. Trust me if you're going through flash cards or material every day for 4-6 hours you will start to leak CBK material and recite it in your sleep. Don't just quiz though, reread the chapters, watch some videos, hit it from all angles.

emerald_octane, by "bagged" do you mean you passed it? In what way were the real questions different from the CCCure questions? Last, did you feel that major subjects were missing from the CCCure questions, or that there was irrelevant/dated info included (like Orange Book)?

moyondizvo

Yes, emerald_octane passed the CISSP exam last year. I passed the exam quite recently too and I did not use the cccure questions so I cannot say a lot about them however reading from past posts, I have gotten the impression that they are not as in depth as the exam. Use the cccure exams to gauge your readiness but do not be misled to think they will guarantee you a pass.

From my knowledge, there is nothing out there that duplicates the exam and the exam experience. You have to be well prepared and across all domains, obviously you cannot be a master of all domains, but at this stage I would recommend that you really work on your weaker domains. Important to grasp the concepts, very important because the exam is testing you on how you apply the concepts. Drill down into the concepts for the next 10 days, just go in hard, whatever you have right now, use it, notes, books, videos, use this time wisely.

cdupuis

Good day to all,

The database of questions from CCCure on my quiz website at https://www.freepracticetests.org/ is constantly being updated and revised. It is not a static DB like you have in books or test you buy from vendors like Boson, Transcender, etc...

The questions are not the same as the one on the exam, this is called BRAINDUMP and THEFT when they are. However, they do cover most of the topics you may run into on the exam and it is a VERY complete set of questions.

Are they dated, they are not. I always invite people to report questions that are in the DB that are no longer on the CBK. For example, someone wrote to me last night asking why I was still covering the TCSEC within my quiz engine. It is there for one simple reason, TCSEC has not been completely removed from the exam and the CBK yet. The latest ISC2 Official Book has more than 3 pages dedicated to the TCSEC. It is still in there.

Are you going to get tons of questions on TCSEC, most likely not. You may even get none. However, when you get 698 on your exam this single question could allow you to pass. We use the holistic approach to studying. If you are not willing to put the work in then it may not be a certification for you. There is no braindump on how to apply knowledge. You must know your stuff.

Best regards

Clement
Owner of the CCCure Family of Portal

cdupuis

Good day to all,

As it was already mentioned there is no single resource that will allow you to pass the CISSP exam. It has to be a mix of experience, study, quiz taking abilities, and how much time you invested.

I have created a page on my website on how to become a CISSP, it is at:

http://www.cccure.org/article1477.html

Read the tips carefully, take the time to watch my flash presentation, and also subscribe to our mailing lists. This will help you quite a bit with your studies and get you off on the right foot to pass this exam.


SECOND

I always stress that students should do as many quizzes as they can before their exam. Do our quizzes and do the quizzes you have within your study book, do quizzes from different sources as well. Using different style of questions will help you get prepare for the very unique style that exists on the exam.

The quiz will give you a few key advantages. It will allow you to find your weakest domains which is what you MUST work on.
The quiz will also allow you to find your weakest subjects within each of the domains, you must work on those as well.
Last but not least the quiz will allow you to remember key topics that you might encounter on the exam.

While doing the quizzes, there a few things you must do:

Do quizzes of at least 50 questions each to have better sampling
Use Pro Level and Closely Related questions, those are the closest to the real exam. It is the default setting.
Keep doing quizzes on the same domain until you score CONSISTENTLY around 80%
Once you reach 80% you move to the next domain. You do this for all of the domain.
While doing quizzes review and find out WHY you miss a question and WHY the best choice is the best choice
You should go through the whole database of question at least once and a few times would be better
Attempt to do a few quizzes of 250 questions on all 10 domains before the real exam. Just to see what it is like to do that much.
After you have done many quizzes you can choose the following options:
- Unattempted Questions only This option will create a quiz with questions you have never seen due to the quiz being randomly generated
- Questions that was answered wrong previously This option allow you to drill down on questions you have missed in the past
The quiz will remember your last setting, to go back to the default click on the button marked Reset Quiz Option/Settings


MOST IMPORTANT DOMAIN ON THE EXAM

Many people have heard that some domains are more important than others as far as the number of questions they will get on the real exam. This is true, There are some key domains that you must do well to ensure a passing mark on the real exam. For the past 12 years I have been doing CISSP training and anytime someone would miss the exam I have seen a fix pattern that emerged. All of the people that failed did badly on one or two of the five most important domains. See my list of domains below, the top domains (in bold below with *) are the most important domains and the at the bottom of the list you have the least important domains.

Telecommunication and Network Security *
Access Control *
Security Architecture *
Information Security Governance and Risk Management *
BCP and DRP *
Software Development Security
Cryptography
Legal, Compliance, Investigation
Operation Security
Physical Security

The are no domains that are NOT important for the exam. Some are more important than others but ensure you review them all.

Best regards

Clement

cgrimaldo

Thank you for that write-up, Clement!

moyondizvo

Thanks for the post Clement, always good to see you posting especially this one and clearing the misconceptions about your site. Like I mentioned, I never managed to use it for my preparation but whilst on that note, one thing I have noticed from a lot CISSP candidates is the desire to have one single resource to study to pass the exam, "So which book can I study to pass the CISSP exam?",and I have responded that there isn't a single book that you can use to pass the exam, one has to use multiple resources and tackle the studying from all angles possible. People use different styles of studying, find one that works for you. I think it's great if someone like Clement can encourage you to use other test banks, goes to show that you really cannot rely on one resource. Thanks for your post Clement, it is very informative.