Passed! Now where?

Long time lurker, first time poster here...

Passed today with an 805. Not as good a score as I thought going in. But a pass is a pass is a pass.

For studying I used Darril's excellent book and Professor Messer's youtube videos. As for the test I had 6-7 simulations. Pretty much all that have been covered in other posts - WAP setup, find the faulty device by logs, firewall setup, port match, attack match, a video showing an attack. I don't know about anybody else but I actually prefer the sims. They're fairly straightforward while a lot of the multiple choice have to be almost translated and deciphered.

Now that I have the CompTIA trifecta, I'm not sure where my next step should be. I'm currently unemployed - actually a stay at home dad - with no IT job experience. I would try to find a job but we're in the process of selling our house and moving cross country. So I'd like to nail down at least one more cert before we move and start applying for openings in our new area. It looks like most go CCNA and some to Linux or MS. Ideally I'd like to get all 3. What do you guys think? Is there a preferred order? Is one more attractive to employers? Or is there a cert I'm missing?

Thanks in advance!

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Comments

Darril

Congratulations on the pass. Glad to hear the book helped.

I think your post is the first time that I heard someone saying they preferred the simulations.

I really don't have a good answer on what's next. Part of it depends on what you want to do and the IT job opportunities where you're going. A CCNA would be valuable, and many of the Microsoft certs would be valuable. In comparison, Linux has a much lower demand for entry level positions, but is often valuable knowledge for advanced positions.

Good luck.

Dakinggamer87

Congrats on pass!!

Good luck with your next adventure

aidan80

Congratulations on your pass. Not sure where you should go next I'm trying to figure out where I should go next lol! I admit when you put it like that I too would rather have the simulations vs having to deal with slippery multiple choice questions. I found the simulations straight to the point no second guessing answers based on one word in a sentence. Having said that I found Microsoft the opposite in their questions. They at times gave what seemed like a paragraph full of information some of which was junk and some relevant to finding the answer.

_Marauder

Congrats on your pass. I agree with Darril. It really depends on the track you want to go.

SharkDiver

Congratulations.
I think the CCNA shows a wider range of knowledge, whereas the Linux+ would be more of a specialty.
Good luck with whatever you choose.

shart1971

Congratulations on your pass!

Master Of Puppets

Congrats!

Sharkbait

Just curious bhurst77, how long did you study? I'm currently studying for the Sec+, but I'm taking a slightly different route. Several posters that I've seen here say they took between 3-6 weeks. By the time I'm ready, I think I'll be into my 5th week or so.

I'm currently in the IT industry, and I think your path is totally up to you. I would consider whether or not you'd be willing/able to move. There are many, many different paths you can take in the IT industry where certs would be helpful. Where you live could be very important. Small city vs. big city...Inland vs coastal. Military town vs. traditional industry/manufacturing town. many things should be considered.

-Sharkbait-

Kopite_21

Congrats on the pass!

bhurst77

Thanks for the replies and advice everybody! I think I'm going to tackle the CCNA next.

@Darril - For me I have trouble sometimes with the way the multiple choice questions are worded. With the simulations they give you clear concise directions. You either know it or you don't.

@sharkbait - I studied for about 4 weeks. I jumped right into it after Network+ which was helpful as it was still fresh. Good luck!

Darril

bhurst77 wrote: »

@Darril - For me I have trouble sometimes with the way the multiple choice questions are worded. With the simulations they give you clear concise directions. You either know it or you don't.

That's good to hear. When they first started adding the new performance based questions to the Security+ exam, a lot of people were complaining that the directions were vague and not clear. It sounds like they were beta questions and CompTIA improved them.

Good luck with the CCNA.