Anyone taken 70-292 and 70-296 recently?

Thought it's about time I got certified on Windows 2003 before the next server OS comes out

A while back m8

But I am also an MCT as well as a freelance consultant spod, and have resources available to help out if required

fwiw

70-296 - Quite easy I thought, most of the questions where put forward with some real world relevance.

70-292 - A total beeeeehatch, I scraped through if I am honest, lot's of not so real world stuff in there. Lots of DNS which I thought was easy, but an aweful lot of stuff on VSS, remote desktop, terminal server.

give me a shout if you need a hand.

I "found" the transcender exams and have a couple of books - the MS one and a Sybex. They seem to be covering very different stuff in there which is nice!

The transcender questions for 292 have a lot of typical MS nonsense in them where nobody in their right mind would ever run a network like that.

Also they have a lot of questions where "the most likely scenario is that someone configured something that isn't even mentioned in the question" and unless you have your telepathy switched on that day you always get the wrong answer.

Still thats the sort of thing you tend to get in real exams so it's good practice.

Well the latest testkings are "very" close to the 292 exam questions, some of the answers in these things are a real giggle, but unfortunately the comedy continues into the exam

Hehe im still waiting for my work muppets to book me my exchange exam.. tis only 9 months since i did the course

Hehe im still waiting for my work muppets to book me my exchange exam.. tis only 9 months since i did the course

Nice and fresh in your mind then.

Well , at least Exchange 2007 isn't too far away now.....

Well i am gettin some exposure to it at work now.. weve got 3 exchange servers... not had to deal with any serious problems with the DB's yet... fingers crossed i never have to

But the exam will be full of questions about interoperability with obscure antique mail systems that you've never heard of , let alone used

True..... i must get some more memory for my pc so i can have a go at breaking some virtual machines

Have been reading bits n bobs on Exchange 07.. and it does look pretty good.. the OWA especially, the direct file access features would be handy for our organisation

Just got back from taking 292.

775 with a pass mark of 700 , so I'm happy enough.

Just got back from taking 292.

775 with a pass mark of 700 , so I'm happy enough.

Cool.. how much revision had you done beforehand?

Congrats. I have been saying i should get the certifications for years, last ones i passed were on NT4. No point upskilling at the moment as most of our infrastructure is on nt4, they did start to upgrade the infrastructure so we now have NT4/2000/2003 servers and exchange 5.5/2000/2003 so lots of fun keeping it all going:rolleyes:

Must find the motivation to sit 292, I have all the study material but having just passed both 270 & 290 within 2 weeks of each other I'm struggling after taking a break (of a month)!

Cool.. how much revision had you done beforehand?

I'd read one of the books a few months ago , but it was basically just since monday.

Annoying thing is , as I was going through the books I was making notes on all the things I've been meaning to do on our network at work and now I've got a huge list of jobs I want to do

Doing 296 in a few weeks time

I'm going to start doing my MCP soon

It's been on the agenda for ages, but with project work, never managed to kick it off. Looks like I'll have some time to do it over the next 6 months or so

But one thing that does puzzle me: it sounds like they still come up with crazy network topologies / OS configurations to test your "debugging" skills. Fair enough, but if no one ever implements or manages to screw a network / system up by that much, isn't it kind of missing the point? You want to be able to diagnose real systems, not crazy ones just imagined in an exam :confused:

This one actually wasn't too bad for "silly" situations.

It tends to be more of the design exams where you get those rather than the administration ones so depending on which of the electives you pick you can avoid some of them.

It's probably best to get started on the exams now , as if you put them off much longer you'll really want to be doing the Vista & Server exams due next year.

Until they have been established for a while the training materials won't be as good as you might have hoped for. Better to get the 2003 MCSE then do a couple of upgrade exams in a year or so.

Thats why I'm doing these two now , so I'm back to "current" should I want to look for a new job in a year or so's time

And I've just done 70-296

887 , and it was noticably easier than 292 with remarkably sensible questions.

That's me now a 2003 MCSE I'm up to date again.

Cool...

where do you take your exams? how much do they cost, and how do you book?

my company have pretty much screwed me over on a promotion into a new "engineering team" which theyve been promising me by saying MCSE is minimum req...

so im gonna pay for the exams myself, claim the cost back and look for a new job at the same time

We just phone up prometric with the details of the exam we want to take and book over the phone , but you can do it online

Thomson Prometric: Microsoft Certification

It costs about 90 quid a go and there are plenty of testing centres you can use.

I've been going to one on the Hagley Road in Birmingham for the last couple

What happens if someone fails?

We point and laugh

We point and laugh

Apart from the "standard" ritual humiliation... i presume it costs another 90 bigguns to re-sit?

Yep.

Not a problem for us as the company pays

Also i guess the client os exams for XP are pretty easy for someone whos been working with, and p!ssing about with since its relase?

They'll ask you questions about oddities that you never use , but if you get a decent book and read through it you'll have no problems