Practice exams

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,
I'm preparing to take the A+ this month (finally!), and am already looking into Network+ and Security+.
I have the A+ practice exam cram book, which is very good. I've read (probably here in the fora, somewhere), that the Network+ is not so. Is that true?
Also, what about the Security+ practice exam cram book?
Cheers.

 

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.

Dont know for real practice exams I used preplogic and Transcender for the A+ but reviewed the Boson exams and they were better. The ones in books are not as long usually so dont have as many as the real exams i.e 100 questions.

For the Network+ I used the previous Mike Meyers book and the Sybex one by Groth plus Transcender exams. My employer is wanting me to get the current network+ for that I using the current Meyers book and Transcenders exams.

 

Take a good look at the uCertify exams. It has a lot of study material and the following number of questions: technologies, 148; media and topologies, 126; devices, 34; management, 74; tools, 44; and security, 74 for a total of 515. On the PrepLogic exams it has: technologies, 46; media and topologies, 49; devices, 37; management, 84; tools, 31; and security, 53 for a total of 300. Meyers discount voucher premium package (which I believe is only good in the states) comes with 700 questions. The Meyer explanations were weak in many cases. Of these if I could only choose one I'd go with uCertify. I have seen the PrepLogic and uCertify go on sale occasionally. In fact, last fall I picked up PrepLogic N+ and S+ for $49 each on sale. Of course there are a lot of other vendors like Boson (but not for N+) and Transcender to name a few.

BTW, these number above are for N+

 

Personally, I'd go for quality over quantity any day.

Tell me - would you rather date a "10" or five "2s"?

 

Actually, I like both! I like the breadth that lots of questions give and the extra learning that higher quality ones give. No one said I couldn't have both (unless you're talking about women because my wife would put the damper on that!

 

I'm not saying that one particular practice exam provider or another is bad... but bad training can be worse than no training at all.

 

what he said ^.

I actually had a look at ucertify and didn't like it but that was just me, I have the transcender one for the N+ but I am wondering how the guarantee you to pass thats usually a method incorporated by braindump companies.

 

Transcender has had a pass guarantee since before I started working there in 2000. Most, if not all, of the legitimate practice test providers (including Boson) have a pass guarantee.

 

Never noticed that tbh before.

 

Yep. If you study the right way (NOT just memorizing our questions and answers, but actually learning the concepts by reading through ALL the explanations, including the ones you answer correctly), you should be able to pass.

 

Five "2s", each with a paper bag on their head.




And one on mine, in case theirs fall off...

 

That certainly is true! That is another reason why I don't just do one practice exam. If you count ProProfs, CompTIA (they do have sample questions but no explanations ), practice exams and questions in the reference books (I always have two or more), and the exams I purchase I actually am using many different exams. So, I am able to see if some are bad in some areas (or even wrong which I know because of the other sources). You definitely can get steered incorrectly if you only depend on one source. To me, the practice tests (lots of them) are just an adjunct to the studying and force me to think and apply what I have learned. And some have better explanations then others and thus are probably "worth" more (which I am willing to pay for). Another use for multiple practice exams as a vicarious tech experience. I'm new to these subjects and have not had the advantage of multiple years of experience that many on this forum have had. The thinking questions give me a taste for that. Well, that is enough philosophy for me tonight!

 

Just wondering, are you allowed to cut eye holes in the bags or is it all by feeling your way around?

 

What exactly 'pass guaranteed' mean?
The way I see it, it's that if you fail, then you get your money back, but this can't surely be?

 

And you'd be right. Transcender and Boson both offer such guarantees but you need to read the terms. Not sure of Transcender's but I think Boson's requires that you sit the exam between 10 and 90 days of purchasing the product (or something like that) and that you meet a few other conditions.

If you do meet said conditions and still fail the exam, they refund you the money for the practice tests you paid for, not the exam fee unfortunately (but still a fair deal). Shows how confident they are in their products

 

You can read the terms of our guarantee here. In short, you have to request a refund within 90 days of your purchase and you have to show proof that you failed the exam within 10-90 days after purchasing our product. The reason we require a 10 day wait before you take the exam is to ensure that you have enough time to study our product before taking the exam.

Note that we only refund the purchase price of the product, not the cost of the exam.

 

Have your T&Cs recently changed for the guarantee? I read it the other day and don't recall it saying you had to fail twice in that period? Maybe I just skimmed it though.

It's worth pointing out that Transcender's Guarantee only requires that you fail once (http://www.transcender.com/pop.aspx?source=gen.aspx?pf=pop&sn=TraAboutCompany_Guarantee) though I wouldn't enter into an exam if you expect to fail

 

No, as far as I know, it's always been like that. But we're not unique in this respect - the two "official" Microsoft-endorsed practice exam providers require that you fail the exam twice before their guarantee applies:

MeasureUp
Self Test

It is interesting to note that Self Test requires that you fail twice even though the content IS EXACTLY THE SAME as Transcender, except the Transcender product contains 10% more questions at a substantial price increase. That premium price allows them to provide that one-fail guarantee.

I don't know the reasoning behind most companies requiring that you fail twice before refunding your money. If I had to guess, I would say that we would be guarding against people failing not because of content coverage, but because of being unfamiliar with the testing environment.

All that said... people rarely have to take advantage of our guarantee.

 

I must have skimmed them then. I suppose the argument about test day nerves or test engine is a valid one though. I still get nervous everytime I go even though I know the format inside out by now.

One thing I didn't like about the recent MS exam (slightly off topic) is that it asked me the feedback questions at the start of the exam! I was like "come on; let me get on with it!". Atleast with the CompTIA one's they ask at the end and give you the opportunity to say "NO". I suppose they get more feedback that way but kind of peeved me a little.