Passed 70-680!

Just wanted to let everyone know and thank everyone who contributed in one way or the other (notes, advice, etc.).

I didn't find the exam to be all that difficult. I scored an 840 And to be completely honest, it was nothing like I was expecting or what people make it out to be. Nowhere near THAT difficult. I am surprised so many people fail this exam.

Resources used:

Don Poulton book
Professor Messer videos
Technet
Techexams 70-680 resource page

These materials are probably all you need to pass the exam. Granted, if you comprehend the material and it sticks with you, you will pass. I also built a Hyper-V server to host vm's on, and purchased a Technet subscription for all the Windows License's I want

. I would suggest having a server running Windows Server 2008 R2, and maybe 2 or 3 Windows 7 Ultimate vm's configured in a domain. I would also play around with Group Policy on the server and enforcing it for the client machines. Learn as much about GP as you can (locations of certain policies and such). I would also suggest learning the basics of Powershell. Not sure if they were experimental questions, but I had a few pertaining to Powershell; things that I had not studied for.

I get a pretty nice bonus from work for passing this exam. Now I have to take the 685 by October, which is completely doable. Anyway, thanks everyone that contributed to the resources page and distributed personal notes for the exam. Greatly appreciated

Let me know if you have any questions.

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Comments

netsysllc

Congrats! Good recommendations, the lab work really helps with the pre-isntall stuff.

jby

congrats! can you please help me i have an exam in 2 weeks and i don't know where i can get prep and mock 70-680 exams for free ? thanks

4_lom

jby wrote: »

congrats! can you please help me i have an exam in 2 weeks and i don't know where i can get prep and mock 70-680 exams for free ? thanks

In all honesty, I don't think you're going to be able to find much for free (that is worth using), as far as practice exams go. But for prep, you could use technet, the 70-680 resource page on this site, or you can find a few related posts on my blog: blog.cisconerd.net. For free exams, you can download evaluations from sites like Transcender, MeasureUp, etc. Good luck on your exam!

matt333

Free MCITP Training

Great videos and Professor Messer videos are good. look around there is alot of resources out there
Good luck

Mstavridis

Congrats on passing!

RomBUS

I think we had a dry spell of good news...so congrats!

robaato

Can you list some details on creating the home domain setup using VM? Is the Srvr the main setup with W7 VM clients or all of them clients on your workstation? Is your Srvr DHCP with DNS forwarding? Did you play with imaging with the clients?

Kopite_21

Congrats on the pass.

tprice5

Good stuff, congrats!

I almost hugged the proctor outside the room when I passed this sucker.

4_lom

robaato wrote: »

Can you list some details on creating the home domain setup using VM? Is the Srvr the main setup with W7 VM clients or all of them clients on your workstation? Is your Srvr DHCP with DNS forwarding? Did you play with imaging with the clients?

I have a dedicated server that I built and installed Hyper-V server 2008. I then created 2 Win Server 2008 R2 servers as guests and also multiple Windows 7/XP clients. Put them all in a domain, and labbed the various technologies for the exam. BranchCache, Event Subscriptions, deployment, WSUS, file sharing, Bitlocker, data collector sets, etc. One of the servers did host DHCP, however not DNS. I have an Ubuntu server VM for DNS. And yes, imaging is a HUGE part of this exam, I would not have taken it without some hands on experience. If you want the hardware specs of my server just let me know. It cost me around $500 shipped from Newegg.

arneyprescott

4_lom wrote: »

I If you want the hardware specs of my server just let me know. It cost me around $500 shipped from Newegg.

Congrats on passing the test mate. I'm pretty sure I'm going to go your route and create my own lab for practicing and would appreciate seeing the specs on your server setup.

Thanks in advance,
Arney P.

Dakinggamer87

Congrats on pass!!

4_lom

Thanks everyone!

4_lom

arneyprescott wrote: »

Congrats on passing the test mate. I'm pretty sure I'm going to go your route and create my own lab for practicing and would appreciate seeing the specs on your server setup.

Thanks in advance,
Arney P.

I'll post specs ASAP, work has been pretty hectic lately.

Devilry

I would like to know the specs of your server, please.

bwillford

4_lom,

Were you able to use WDS to push images out for install through hyper-v? I have been trying to lab this but never seem to be able to get it to work. Do you think this is something that needs to be labbed or just know the theory behind WDS?

loerel

4_lom,

I'm currently using the Poulton book, as well as the Messer and itfreetraining.com videos as resources. I have a question for you about the sample exam included on the CD that came with the Poulton book though.. Did you find the actual exam to be more or less challenging than the sample questions? Are the questions more or less straight forward on the exam, or are they long winded with excessive details such as on the training CD? I sat down today and took my first exam off the CD, I did alright for a first run through but felt I was scoring better on the few brain **** I downloaded.

Thanks for the insight and Congrats on the pass!

4_lom

loerel wrote: »

4_lom,

I'm currently using the Poulton book, as well as the Messer and itfreetraining.com videos as resources. I have a question for you about the sample exam included on the CD that came with the Poulton book though.. Did you find the actual exam to be more or less challenging than the sample questions? Are the questions more or less straight forward on the exam, or are they long winded with excessive details such as on the training CD? I sat down today and took my first exam off the CD, I did alright for a first run through but felt I was scoring better on the few brain **** I downloaded.

Thanks for the insight and Congrats on the pass!

You used brain ****??

4_lom

bwillford wrote: »

4_lom,

Were you able to use WDS to push images out for install through hyper-v? I have been trying to lab this but never seem to be able to get it to work. Do you think this is something that needs to be labbed or just know the theory behind WDS?

I was able to lab this without issue. What are you using for your lab? Technically, you just need to know the theory behind it.

4_lom

Devilry wrote: »

I would like to know the specs of your server, please.

ASRock 970 EXTREME3

Antec EarthWatts Green EA-380D

AMD Phenom II X4 965 Black Edition Deneb

G.SKILL Sniper Low Voltage Series 8GB (x2)

[h=1]APEX SK-393-C Black Steel ATX Mid Tower[/h]

SONY Black SATA DVD-ROM Drive

Cheap, but it's got it where it counts

bwillford

similar specs to my desktop, what hard drives are you using? Raided?

btw, noticed you were from south bend, I am originally from La Porte, moved down to SC a few years back for work though.

loerel

4_lom wrote: »

You used brain ****??

Sure, theres a collection of all different ones at exam collection (google it). Have you had a bad experience with them? I know when I studied for the COMPTIA A+ exams I used a Pearson Study CD (just like like the Poulton one) and when I actually got to the exam the questions weren't even as close to the length.

Qord

loerel wrote: »

Sure, theres a collection of all different ones

Not sure if you realize this, but that is highly frowned upon.

loerel

Qord wrote: »

Not sure if you realize this, but that is highly frowned upon.

I did not, a friend of mine that works for a consulting firm suggested them as a resource for me to check out.

kriscamaro68

loerel wrote: »

I did not, a friend of mine that works for a consulting firm suggested them as a resource for me to check out.

Your friend is lame. Brain **** are illegal, can have you get your certs stripped, and just devalue the cert. What is the point of cheating? It proves nothing other than you can memorize the questions and don't know the material. It is people like your friend that make it harder for us who actually obtain them by learning the material. **** only help in making employers think that certs are worthless.

loerel

kriscamaro68 wrote: »

Your friend is lame. Brain **** are illegal, can have you get your certs stripped, and just devalue the cert. What is the point of cheating? It proves nothing other than you can memorize the questions and don't know the material. It is people like your friend that make it harder for us who actually obtain them by learning the material. **** only help in making employers think that certs are worthless.

I appreciate the insight on the brain ****, guess I was being a bit naive. I'll shy away from their use in the future, I'd rather become certified under my own esteem.

robaato

I'm interested on how you setup the lab. I didn't get anywhere near as far as you did and it was taking to much study time.

4_lom

bwillford wrote: »

similar specs to my desktop, what hard drives are you using? Raided?

btw, noticed you were from south bend, I am originally from La Porte, moved down to SC a few years back for work though.

Always good to meet a fellow Hoosier. I'm using Caviar Blacks btw

4_lom

loerel wrote: »

Sure, theres a collection of all different ones at exam collection (google it). Have you had a bad experience with them? I know when I studied for the COMPTIA A+ exams I used a Pearson Study CD (just like like the Poulton one) and when I actually got to the exam the questions weren't even as close to the length.

No, I've had no experience with them. And neither should you. Using brain **** is wrong. Not only does it devalue your certification, but it also devalue's MINE. So STOP using them.

4_lom

robaato wrote: »

I'm interested on how you setup the lab. I didn't get anywhere near as far as you did and it was taking to much study time.

Are there more direct question's you'd like to ask?