State my goals to keep myself accountable :P First off, Hi! Been lurking here for a few weeks and decided to register today after seeing a few things I wanted to give my $0.02 on. Lots of good information here, hoping this helps and keeps me on track.
A little about me: In a previous life I was a programmer, and switched to the System Engineer team a couple of years ago. I've done quite well for myself on the SE team, but I still feel I have more to prove as a reformed programmer
Eventually I want to get my MCSE in Private Cloud and probably Server Infrastructure, but I've got to get the MCSA first :P
Now, on to the good stuff! I tried earlier this year to study for the 70-410 exam, blocking off 4 hours a week on Friday mornings at work, but that soon fell by the wayside as time got sparse for other things. It completely disappeared after taking a practice test at Ignite in May and failing miserably due to the ticky-tack nature of some of the questions. I realized it was going to take a lot more effort and practice to get the cert, and it was time I just didn't have at work or home with a new baby in the house.
Anyway, the baby is now 1 and a little bit less dependent on us, and the work schedule is slowing down slightly, so I figure I can do this again and maybe learn from my mistake(s) a bit... I'm thinking of spreading the study time out this time, like an hour each day and then maybe 2 on Fridays for labs and stuff, with time at home for reading and whatnot as well. I'm going to have my workplace pay for practice tests from MeasuredUp (this is the provider Microsoft used at Ignite in their practice test room) and use those on Fridays as well.
I work with most everything Server 2012R2 every day, especially Hyper-V and SCVMM. About the only thing I don't deal with a lot is AD because we have a dedicated team for AD management where I work. I'm fairly good with powershell, but my recall for the exact commands is not exactly the best (and I found that the practice tests really hammer on that perfect recall; seems silly in today's google-driven world). My only fear is that I will study and lab and practice test until I'm blue in the face and still will get nailed on the Powershell "Is it Get-ABC or is it Get-ACB" type questions, small variations that make a big difference that I would usually look up on Google/MSDN to know what I needed for sure.
From those of you that have taken the tests, are there a lot of questions like that? Very nearly the same answer, but with only a slight variation in parameter sent in or name of the cmdlet? And how does the plan for study sound? I don't know that this approach will work, but I've got to try something because I really want this cert.
Thanks everyone, looking forward to seeing you guys around and sharing tips/tricks/info/horror stories/whatever!
