What OS Is most relevant to Network+ and Beyond

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I'm MCDST and A+ certified already and haven't really done anything for nearly a year in regards to certs.

I was thinking of starting the N+ and have an oldish PC sitting in front of me with no OS, My only question is what should I run on it?

XP
7
or a Linux distro

I've tried Linux briefly (Ubuntu and Fedora) but most times it's been just installing, then switching back over.

What would be most relevant for the N+? I mainly run a mac osx laptop so have some knowhow with Unix in the terminal.

 

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Well having used the Mike Meyers book for the old N+ and the New one aswell as the sybex book then I would say XP. And if if you pla to do further MS certs then it still xp and win2k3

 

Although the CompTIA exams are supposed to be vendor neutral I found the N+ 'more neutral' than the A+

A+ looks mainly at XP and Vista however I found very little in N+ that should worry you too much about which OS to practice on.

I thought MS certs were generally geared at a specific OS? Meaning if you planned on doing Win 7 certs for example (MCTS), it would be best going with Win 7? Or going for XP if you're after MCDST?

 

Well obviousley if your doing the MCTS in Vista or 7 then it will be those OSs but if your doing the MCSE,MCSA or MCPs like the 70-270 then its xp and win2k3 then theres server 2008 for certs that belong to that.

Microsoft are trying to push windows 7 thats why they want that cert to be more predominant but most businesses wil use xp for years to come even after MS stop supporting it. So being certrified in xp and win2k3 before windows 7, vista and server 2008 should be done first.

 

Thats fair enough although I do think it's worth mentioning that it depends on the bussiness requirments and how dependant they are on support, updates etc.

The company I work for, for example, is currently using XP however they wish to move due to the impending lack of support, to Windows 7, completely skipping Vista. As XP is so popular, and a lot of bussiness may have a similar logic, I'd imagine a lot more are going to make the move than may be expected.

The reason I bring this up is I was considering the MCDST and mentioned it to work and they basicly said it's not worth my time, focus on Win 7 MCTS instead. This is my personal situation of course but I thought it worth mentioning.

 

Another reason I don't believe it's so clear cut. You also run the risk of your certs being viewed as 'paper certs' if you have never actually worked with and supported them, you've simply read a book.

I do appologise if it seems like I'm ranting by the way, after reading my posts back I didn't mean to sound rude!

 

I think this has strayed a bit of course. The question was what OS is more common to the N+. Since the Meyers book and Sybex book tell how to do things like accessing my Network places in xp then I would say xp is the answer.

As for what Sparky said yep thats right certify in what you use or as I would advise if you dont work with anything certify in whats most common aslong as you dont go overboard and over certify.

 

Cool, thanks for the advice, do you think I'd be able to learn it all using a Virtual Machine? Thing is the only laptop I've got around for the next few months is a macbook. I can't really install Windows on it because the hard drive only has 1 partition and with 14GB free won't let me resize it.

The thing with VM's is that it sets up bridged networking, so will this hinder my training?

 

I used virtual pc since my A+ so no it wont. A lot of peaople learn this way, some people setup their own proper labs.