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I just passed the Server+ exam and I thought I'd cast my afterthoughts about the exam on to the Internet for any other interested people to read.

I passed the A+ exam two months ago. The typical track is to next acquire the Network+ cert. However, after reviewing the material for both Network+ and Server+, I decided the Server+ exam looked to be more of the natural next step after the A+. Although I have years of both server and network experience, it looked as though I’d have a much tougher time passing Server+, so might as well get it out of the way ASAP.

I studied for about six weeks, starting with reading through the Server+ Certification Bible by Trevor Kay and Sybex’s Server+ Study Guide, and the MS Press Server+ Certification Training Kit. Both Kay’s and Sybex’s books are definitely worth reading. The one from MS Press is lacking in depth.

I viewed most of the VTC Training CD for Server Plus. The material was not detailed enough to be truly useful for the exam. Also, the speaker on the video didn’t make the presentation of the material very interesting.

I also had a skim through the usual @!#?@! and CramSession braindump publications. They cover a lot of material, but most of their questions don’t really resemble those on the actual exam. Neither does most of the Question Of the Day (QOD) practice questions available from several certification web sites.

Starting two weeks before my exam, I started going through the Server+ practice exams by Transcender, Boson, and MeasureUp. I’d have to say that the format and content of Transcender’s questions most closely match the actual Server+ exam. Both Boson and MeasureUp have nice practice exams, but many of the questions contain material that you won’t see on the Server+ exam. If you can pass all of these practice exams then you definitely know your server stuff.

As for the Server+ exam itself, it is 80 questions in length, you have 90 minutes to complete it, and a score of 75 or better is required to pass. It took me just over an hour to answer all of the questions and I passed with an 82. I spent 10 minutes or so reviewing a few of my answers and ended up changing one or two. I decided that second-guessing my gut was not a good thing, so I didn’t bother to completely review the entire exam (I might have ended up with a lower score if I did).

Make no mistake that the Server+ exam is about HARDWARE. At least half of the questions in some way involved RAID, SCSI, or tape backup strategies. A significant portion involved trouble-shooting of failed components, network problems, and performance problems using “best practices” methodology. The networking questions were fairly easy, so I really don’t think you need a Network+ cert before getting your Server+ if you are already comfortable with network design and troubleshooting. There was only two or three MS Windows-specific questions, and only one involving multiple OSes.

Probably one-third of the questions were the complex, scenario-based questions that describe a problem in detail and ask you how to diagnose and/or resolve it. These weren’t nearly as complex as many on the M$ exams, but two or three were so ambiguous that it was truly impossible to determine a single, correct answer. I won’t give an example, but all of the commercial practice exams have the same type of head scratchers in them.

One funny thing I noticed was that none of the exam questions were multiple choice (i.e., all radio button and no check boxes). There were also no “none of the choices” selections. There were a dozen or so questions that offered four possible explanations and asked you to choose the one(s) you thought would apply. For example (not an actual exam question):

Thirty minutes before taking the Server+ exam you should:

I. Arrive at the test center.
II. Make sure you have two forms of identification.
III. Flirt with all the women at the test center taking nursing exams.
IV. Slam some coffee and ephedra and engage in Primal Scream therapy.

O I and III
O II and IV
O III only
O I, II, III and IV

Now keep in mind that my exam contained only 80 of the hundreds (or thousands?) of questions in the Server+ exam questions pool. Just because I saw or didn’t see something on my exam doesn’t mean you will or won’t see it. As the saying goes: Your Mileage May Vary (YMMV).

In My Humble Opinion: THE SERVER+ EXAM IS PASSABLE AND THE CERT IS WORTH AQUIRING! Learn everything you can about RAID, SCSI, tape backup hardware and strategies, and server problem troubleshooting. Make server upgrading, configuring, networking, performance tuning, and environmental conditions and security secondary in your study. And, of course, you must have experience working in that big, cold machine room!

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