Passed 70-646

Scored 962. Was expecting something harder, but it was quiet easy. Some questions were out of Windows 2008 scope: you were expected to know something about System Center, Sharepoint, differences between 2008 versions.

I used Trainsignal videos, MS Press book and Measureup test, no lab (run out of time). Spent two weeks preparing, total ~60 hours. I think I have wasted my time watching Trainsignal - basically it was the same material as in 70-640 and 70-642 videos and I remember them good.
Also for those who doesn't have much hands-on practice on Server 2008, then may be logical step to take 70-643 first, because exam full of questions about RDS and IIS.

About R2 questions: I had no questions that needed to know R2 specific features, although all questions included words "2008 R2".

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Comments

Michael.J.Palmer

Congrats on the high score!

Reseven

Congratz on the pass!
Nice score as well!

RoRsChAcH

Congrats....just starting studying for this test today so thanks for the feedback!

Psoasman

Congrats on your pass, nice score!

bertieb

Great score. Well done

TrainSignalEric

Congrats on the pass! I'd love to get more feedback from you on our course. Feel free to PM me.

Ahriakin

Well done

za3bour

Congratulations, I actually found the exam hard so good for you

rushdown

awesome! I also started studying for this exam today.

So, i was thinking about just going with the Train Signal videos + any book from the bookstore that's good.

So, let me get this straight, you did no labs at all?

Good job. I am not planning on doing any labs either because I don't have a good computer and I only have 2.

MickQ

Well done! That's a sweet score.

earweed

Congrats on the great score! I just passed the 70-647 and I'm debating taking this one.

Dakinggamer87

Congrats on pass!!

Nice score

Povilas

rushdown wrote: »

So, let me get this straight, you did no labs at all? Good job. I am not planning on doing any labs either because I don't have a good computer and I only have 2.

I didn't do any labs for this particular exam. But 80-90% of this exam material is covered by my day to day tasks at work, so in a way i do lab... everyday

Have you already taken 70-640 and 70-642 exams?

Essendon

rushdown wrote: »

I am not planning on doing any labs either because I don't have a good computer and I only have 2.

You dont need a great computer. All you need is a processor that does VT-x (virtualisation) and hardware DEP, I think any Intel e6500 and above does VT-x. You need a bit of RAM though. You need a 64 bit host OS to run 2008 R2 in any virtualisation program. You need about 12-15GB per VM, so you can get by with even a 120GB HDD, although things will be slowww. Another good thing, Microsoft have a full copy of 2008 R2 on their website just in case you didnt know.

What kinda computer do you have at the moment? You'll be surprised that it wont cost as much to upgrade your machine to do the labs. And labs are what really teach the material. You dont want to be a paper tiger, no point in having the cert and then not being able to tell a DC apart from a member server.

rushdown

Povilas wrote: »

I didn't do any labs for this particular exam. But 80-90% of this exam material is covered by my day to day tasks at work, so in a way i do lab... everyday

Have you already taken 70-640 and 70-642 exams?

Nope, I have not taken either of those two exams. I work in IT also and we have some Win 2K3 and Win 2K8 servers I can mess around with though. So, I do get to play around with Server 2008 a bit as well.

rushdown

Essendon wrote: »

You dont need a great computer. All you need is a processor that does VT-x (virtualisation) and hardware DEP, I think any Intel e6500 and above does VT-x. You need a bit of RAM though. You need a 64 bit host OS to run 2008 R2 in any virtualisation program. You need about 12-15GB per VM, so you can get by with even a 120GB HDD, although things will be slowww. Another good thing, Microsoft have a full copy of 2008 R2 on their website just in case you didnt know.

What kinda computer do you have at the moment? You'll be surprised that it wont cost as much to upgrade your machine to do the labs. And labs are what really teach the material. You dont want to be a paper tiger, no point in having the cert and then not being able to tell a DC apart from a member server.

I've got an Asus G73JH laptop. I don't know if the processor does VT-x or hardware DEP? My laptop has an Intel i7 Q740, it has Windows 7 64 bit OS with only 6 GB of RAM. I've got 340 GB HD space available. And, no, I didn't know that MS has a full copy of R2 on their website. Is it free?

On a sidenote, I downloaded VMPlayer and successfully got Windows Server 2008 Enterprise Edition to run on it a few minutes ago on my laptop. The Train Signal video told me I need to run three of these virtual machines on it. I hope my laptop can handle it. I know it's a good laptop for playing games, I'm not sure about running virtual machines however because I've never really done it before.

Edit: I just went to www.dreamspark.com and saw that Microsoft had Server 2008 R2 and Server 2008 (both Standard Edition), is this what you were talking about?

Essendon

Man that computer is darn good for the labs. I only have 4GB of RAM on my e6500 500GB system, and I am getting by. With 6GB RAM, you are well set. The i7 absolutely does VT-x, and I dont think you can install 2008 R2 without VT-x.

Here's my setup. I have dual-booted my machine (2008 r2 and Windows 7). With 2008 R2 running as my host system, I can play with Hyper-v as well (and this a fairly major topic on the 643 and 647 exams, so make sure you lab it). I'd recommend you do this too.

You are good to go, just lab away. 2008 r2 is available for free download at Download Windows Server 2008 R2 with SP1

You only need to download this once and can run multiple VM's off it (although running more than 3-4 will slow things down).

P.S. By full copy I meant, a full trial copy that's valid for 180 days upon first activation. 180 days is enough anyways, to get around it you can either rearm it or delete the VM and recreate it and activate again and you have another 180 days.

earweed

Essendon wrote: »

With 6GB RAM, you are well set. The i7 absolutely does VT-x, and I dont think you can install 2008 R2 without VT-x.

).

2008 R2 will run fine by itself without VT-x. I have 2008 R2 as a dual boot on my desktop (just a pentium D) but just can't do Hyper-v on it.

rushdown

Essendon wrote: »

Man that computer is darn good for the labs. I only have 4GB of RAM on my e6500 500GB system, and I am getting by. With 6GB RAM, you are well set. The i7 absolutely does VT-x, and I dont think you can install 2008 R2 without VT-x.

Here's my setup. I have dual-booted my machine (2008 r2 and Windows 7). With 2008 R2 running as my host system, I can play with Hyper-v as well (and this a fairly major topic on the 643 and 647 exams, so make sure you lab it). I'd recommend you do this too.

You are good to go, just lab away. 2008 r2 is available for free download at Download Windows Server 2008 R2 with SP1

You only need to download this once and can run multiple VM's off it (although running more than 3-4 will slow things down).

P.S. By full copy I meant, a full trial copy that's valid for 180 days upon first activation. 180 days is enough anyways, to get around it you can either rearm it or delete the VM and recreate it and activate again and you have another 180 days.

Thanks for all the information!

Essendon

earweed wrote: »

2008 R2 will run fine by itself without VT-x. I have 2008 R2 as a dual boot on my desktop (just a pentium D) but just can't do Hyper-v on it.

Ok in that case, I stand corrected. Thanks weed, for clearing that out.

Povilas

rushdown wrote: »

Nope, I have not taken either of those two exams. I work in IT also and we have some Win 2K3 and Win 2K8 servers I can mess around with though. So, I do get to play around with Server 2008 a bit as well.

Why are you taking this exam as very first? It doesn't give any title or certificate without other two and it contains a lot of material from 640 and 642 exams - if you will take these two first, then you already will know 50% of material for 646 exam.

rushdown

Povilas wrote: »

Why are you taking this exam as very first? It doesn't give any title or certificate without other two and it contains a lot of material from 640 and 642 exams - if you will take these two first, then you already will know 50% of material for 646 exam.

Oh, I didn't know that. Which should I take first? I assume it's the 640 test?

certhelp

Povilas wrote: »

Why are you taking this exam as very first?

Because his name is RushDown!