MCDST more 'useful' than Comptia certs in the sense that...

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...someone working for an employment agency, who's not that clued up about IT, will more likely have heard of Microsoft?

Or if a CV's scanned electronically then the word 'Microsoft' and/or the initials 'MCP' will more likely be 'picked up'?

 

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possibly
who knows?

 

If they're "not that clued up about IT", how effective will they be in getting you an IT job??

 

If the employer is actually active within the IT community be it online or industry wise then he'll probably know both but i've always viewed the MCDST as above the A+ just because the topics it covers are harder than those of the A+ to me but thats just opinion.

 

It's the recruiter's job to know what's relevant to the position they are interviewing for. 5 minutes on google will tell you that A+/Net+/Sec+ > MCDST

 

I support numerous recruitment agencies, with some being in IT.

All of them use CV scanners, due to the shear number of applications they recieve. These pick out keywords, then they filter the rest of the CV's manually.

Most recruiters know what an MCP is, do they know what an A+ or Network + is, most likely not.

To back this up, my old employeer, I asked all of the Team Leaders (3 of them) if they knew about CompTIA A+, all of them said no.

I'm not saying that the A+ and N+ are irrelevant, as they are not. They are just not widely known.

 

Just to be a t0sser, I have to say, that in all my experience, most clueless IT 'Support' Managers (a lot of them are just that) seem to worship the almighty and all powerful A+!!! That is just what I've noticed of course!

However, the A+ was a great cert in my opinion...yes the exam was a bit of a let down with it's one sentence questions BUT I learnt a hell of a lot from the Myers book!

 

I would have to echo the comments of Mr. Dude here. Possibly because I work mainly with hardware at the moment (doing warranty desktop and printer repairs for HP). In this job, the A+ is golden. I guess it all depends on what you are looking to apply for. Having said that, I am not sure that many recruiters know what the MCDST is either; the only advantage it seems to have is the word Microsoft that will pop up on the scanners.

I guess in that case, if you have the A+ and the Network+ you could be cheeky and put something like "Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator (MCSA) 2003 Elective (CompTIA A+ and Network+)" just to make sure you get as many scanner-friendly buzzwords into your CV as possible

Just my 2p...