Experience needed for MCAD

Oh man! Ad-blocking software has been detected! :'(

This website is run by the community, for the community... and it needs advertisements in order to keep running. Blocking our ads means your killing our stats!
Please disable your ad-block, or become a premium member to hide all advertisements and this notice.

Hi Guys,
I am planning to give MCAD certification starting with 70-315. I wanted to know as to how many years of experience do you need to give the exam? I have just 1 year exp in .net and 2 years IT exp. Will that suffice? And if yes then how much time will it take to prepare for the first exam (i.e. 70-315) if I devote say 8 hours a day !!

-Sony

 

Oh man! Ad-blocking software has been detected! :'(

This website is run by the community, for the community... and it needs advertisements in order to keep running. Blocking our ads means your killing our stats!
Please disable your ad-block, or become a premium member to hide all advertisements and this notice.

Hi welcome to CF! Sorry MCAD isnt my field but im sure someone will be here shortly to help. In the meantime would you like to pop into the New Members forum so everyone can say hi!

just my 2p are you going to be dedicated enough for 8 hours a day? what you need to remember that its not a race and you need to make sure you know the product enough to be certified. JMO

 

Hi, welcome aboard. I would say if you can spare eight hours a day you should go for it.

Si

 

Depends how you study.

8 hours a day is hell of a lot for intense work. I would suggest balancing study with a bit of research and experimentation.

You can study anything from zero experience, it just takes more work!

Microsoft like to specify minimum requirements for everything, including their certs - but I'm sure anyone will tell you that these tend to be a little bit OTT.

 

Hey...thanks for those replies...I actually plan to take a break from my work for a month or so..Thats why I said I would be putting in at least 8hours/day of dedicated "theoretical study and practice work"........ Still no one has told me as to roughly how many days-weeks-months of prep will I need to go for it??
I have a few more questions
-whats the pattern of questions they ask in 70-315?
- Is it objective?
- And how many questions?
- Is there negative marking?
- Whats the fees??
- Once I give one of the 3 papers, is there any time limit within which I need to give the remaining papers??

I know there are too many questions, but your replies would be of a great help !!

 

Hi Sony,

It's difficult to give an exact time frame to complete the exam as it depends on how you pick up the different topics, which are covered by the exam. With 1 year exp in .net I'll assume you know your way around visual studio and you've done the standard 'hello world' applications so this will help a lot. If I remember the 70-315 is web applications in C# and I think if you get a decent book (I got the official Microsoft one here) and you balance well with practical exercises and assuming everything goes well in your studying then you should be able to get it done it under 6 months. If you’re committed and you grasp the subject matter then I'm sure you can get in done quicker but it’s difficult to give an exact time frame.

The pattern of questions is more scenario based than syntax and there can be up to 50 in the exam (I had 38 I think), the marking is difficult to know as Microsoft keep these things under raps but I’m pretty sure there isn’t negative marking. There isn’t a time frame by which you have to do all three exams but I know Microsoft are changing different exams all the time so you never know.

As for money as I don’t know where you’re from I can only state that each exam costs about £88 in the UK and then there is the study materials on top.

Hope this helps

Muir

 

Hi Muir,

Your reply was undoubtedly of help.

In 1 year of experience I have worked a lot with ADO.NET, user controls, server controls, deployment...Havent touched on Web Services and Remoting..Though have a rough theoretical knowledge, And have read a lot about caching,security, debugging etc....

If I am completely comitted and have the knowledge as mentioned above then is 2-3 months sufficient for scoring in 70-315 ?

Does the number of question vary from person to person??

I am right now in US, so I guess it would cost around $160 per paper...Anyways my company is gonna pay for it So no issues

I have
This book

Hope its enough !!

 

this will be useful too!

Are you aware MS has a newer cert out on the market at the moment?

 

Hi Sony,

Yes the numbers do vary but know more than 50 you can’t give a definite answer.

That book is really good and it’s the one I've got and as Zimbo pointed out I'd definitely get the Transcender CD as it is the best legal revision tool around. If you’re concerned about completely the course quickly then the Transcender will undoubtedly speed things up and is worth the extra cash.

Best of luck

Muir

 

Hey Muir,
On what basis do they decide the number of questions ??
I have started off with my studies full fledged...Planning to finish this book by aug end... Then wud need a lot of tips on practical exp... Am counting on u guys !!
Thanks...
Sony.

 

Hi,

Your experience is sufficient for these exams...if you study well from the reference books you will crack the exam..

Regards