Planning to get a few certs to start out, suggestions and feedback appreciated. =)
hypertek
Registered Users Posts: 4 ■□□□□□□□□□
A little background about me, No college degree (thought I did attend a few years), Will be 30 in a year. Been unemployed for a few years sadly. Was hired as a field service technician for a good company that requires nationwide travel to servicing hospital equipment, but outside of my control I was never scheduled to come in or sent out on assignment (I don't know why, step dad works there, but nothing he can do about it).... But that job looks good on my resume. With today's economy, I been frustrated with not being able to get a job.. I know some guys may not see it from my point of view, as there are always people working at mcdonalds etc, but it is really tough.
Now My personal hobby as always been pc hardware. Ever since I was a kid, if i wanted to play a pc game on my crappy IBM 486sx computer at the time, I had to tinker with it. upgrade parts etc. Today my pcs are watercooled and overclocked, I always mod them for gaming, so I am confident of my pc technical skills as well as software. I have lapped cpus, run raid 0 on my hard drives, overclocked the hell out of my cpu and gpus, volt modded an old video card. Had water leaks in my first attempts at watercooling, but it was all a good learning experience etc.
2010 I went to a local technical school for drafting, we used autocad. I passed that and am still paying the student loan on it, which sucks. That school i went to is under probation due to alot of prior students also reporting they where not able to get jobs (employers don't seem to value credentials from for-profit schools).
A few weeks ago I been thinking about getting A+ certified, in which I learned it is fairly easy to obtain and than i can go from there. I would be happy with a desk support job to get the ball rolling. Then maybe supplement it with another certificate or 2 to get out of entry level.
During a few old jobs that I had in offices, i recall how nice it would have been to be one of the IT guys lol. Though i never really pursued the career, though I have tried applying for jobs in help desk etc, to never get back any response.
I do have a few friends telling me that A+ is worthless and how they got jobs with nothing, of course that is luck of the draw today in my opinion, as today has so much more applicants and employers like to use something to weed out the number of applicants to make it easier on them to choose someone. If you guys have any other recommendations on certs I could check out, let me know. Appreciate it!
I am selling some of my stuff to purchase the A+ vouchers.
Now My personal hobby as always been pc hardware. Ever since I was a kid, if i wanted to play a pc game on my crappy IBM 486sx computer at the time, I had to tinker with it. upgrade parts etc. Today my pcs are watercooled and overclocked, I always mod them for gaming, so I am confident of my pc technical skills as well as software. I have lapped cpus, run raid 0 on my hard drives, overclocked the hell out of my cpu and gpus, volt modded an old video card. Had water leaks in my first attempts at watercooling, but it was all a good learning experience etc.
2010 I went to a local technical school for drafting, we used autocad. I passed that and am still paying the student loan on it, which sucks. That school i went to is under probation due to alot of prior students also reporting they where not able to get jobs (employers don't seem to value credentials from for-profit schools).
A few weeks ago I been thinking about getting A+ certified, in which I learned it is fairly easy to obtain and than i can go from there. I would be happy with a desk support job to get the ball rolling. Then maybe supplement it with another certificate or 2 to get out of entry level.
During a few old jobs that I had in offices, i recall how nice it would have been to be one of the IT guys lol. Though i never really pursued the career, though I have tried applying for jobs in help desk etc, to never get back any response.
I do have a few friends telling me that A+ is worthless and how they got jobs with nothing, of course that is luck of the draw today in my opinion, as today has so much more applicants and employers like to use something to weed out the number of applicants to make it easier on them to choose someone. If you guys have any other recommendations on certs I could check out, let me know. Appreciate it!
I am selling some of my stuff to purchase the A+ vouchers.
Comments
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N2IT
Inactive Imported Users Posts: 7,483 ■■■■■■■■■■
If you like Hardware A+ is a good certification to land. There are several reasons why. It's still recognized as a value to hiring managers for shops that do PC repair. A lot of the vendors Lenovo, Dell, etc either require you to have A+ or have A+ in conjunction with their own vendor certifications. A+ also still helps you get on the help desk as well. I think A+ aligns with your former position/skills and the ones you may be interested in honing. Other skills you may want to consider are the Microsoft client operating system exams. Those could help push you into a little bit higher of a role. Like a tier 2 help desk position or a more complex desk side position. Good luck on your search! -
NetworkVeteran
Member Posts: 2,338 ■■■■■■■■□□
N2IT's advice sounds spot on. Good luck with your career.
