Failed 70-292 and 70-296 today

Failed both exams today.

Okay not that much for 70-296... with only 663/700 (I knew that I fell short
in time for preparation) but I am still wondering what a 350/700 means for
70-292.
Above all, I am wondering what kind of tormented guys have written down the
questions for 70-292. Questions that are formulated like sibylline
prophecies. Incomplete informations that will do no good in helping
answering the questions.
With such unfair questions, braindumps are promised a long long life!
I have the feeling that I would have scored exactly the same if I would have
randomly chosen the answers.
All this makes me wonder what all that is for? And whether I will
re-certify.
This leads me to ask one question: do you really think that a certification
is of any help, as promised by Microsoft? Until now it made no difference
for me, whether it was for an answer to a RFP or whether it was about
seeking a new job. In such cases, the certifications were only a very
(microscopic?) minor differentiator.
I fell that the only good reasons for passing these certifications are: 1)
Intellectual satisfaction, 2) Proof that one is still able to learn and pass
exams and 3) Proving a minimal level of knowledge (and NOT experience as
claimed by Microsoft).
If anyone has another good reason, maybe I will give it another try.

Charles Lehmann

Charles Lehmann

"Charles Lehmann" <> wrote
> I fell that the only good reasons for passing these certifications are: 1)
> Intellectual satisfaction, 2) Proof that one is still able to learn and
pass
> exams and 3) Proving a minimal level of knowledge (and NOT experience as
> claimed by Microsoft).
> If anyone has another good reason, maybe I will give it another try.

I would agree that MS certification is not having the results that MS is
intending. The main certifcation does is get your resume past the HR bots
and hopefully land you an interview, then your proven experience will get
you a job.

So, I guess the bottom line is are the jobs you applying for requiring
certification?

T-Bone
MCNGP XL

T-Bone

did you hear "Charles Lehmann" <>
say in news:4219fcb1$0$3413$:

> I fell that the only good reasons for passing these certifications
> are: 1) Intellectual satisfaction, 2) Proof that one is still able to
> learn and pass exams and 3) Proving a minimal level of knowledge (and
> NOT experience as claimed by Microsoft).

sounds about right. except for the exam providing minimal experience.
Exams don't provide experience with a product, it's the other way round.
If you have experience you will be successful with the exam.

--
Neil MCNGP#30 (MCSE2003)

- Just because I don't care doesn't meant I don't understand.

Neil

Personally I think the exam should be more practical based. e.g. you get a
virtual PC, plus maybe a server, and a problem is setup inside that virtual
network. Then its down to experiance to troubleshoot and fix that problem!
You'd gain points for each troubleshooting step taken i.e. 2 systems, unable
to communicate, so you ping loopback - 1 point, ping the local ip - 1 point,
ping the gateway - 1 point etc... I think a practical would be a) test your
skills and experiance better, 2) be more fun, as you wouldn't have to read
27 pages of text relating to the scenario, you could just get on with fixing
it, and c) be harder to brain dump, as people wouldn't be able to go in and
just copy down all the questions to sell on the internet!


"Neil" <guess!!!@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:Xns960473E175393neilmcsegmailcom@207.46.248.1 6...
> did you hear "Charles Lehmann" <>
> say in news:4219fcb1$0$3413$:
>
> > I fell that the only good reasons for passing these certifications
> > are: 1) Intellectual satisfaction, 2) Proof that one is still able to
> > learn and pass exams and 3) Proving a minimal level of knowledge (and
> > NOT experience as claimed by Microsoft).
>
> sounds about right. except for the exam providing minimal experience.
> Exams don't provide experience with a product, it's the other way round.
> If you have experience you will be successful with the exam.
>
> --
> Neil MCNGP#30 (MCSE2003)
>
> - Just because I don't care doesn't meant I don't understand.

Ben

eyes glazed over from the weekend?

"Neil" <guess!!!@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:Xns960473E175393neilmcsegmailcom@207.46.248.1 6...
> did you hear "Charles Lehmann" <>
> say in news:4219fcb1$0$3413$:
>
> > I fell that the only good reasons for passing these certifications
> > are: 1) Intellectual satisfaction, 2) Proof that one is still able to
> > learn and pass exams and

> > *******3) Proving a minimal level of knowledge (and
> > NOT experience as claimed by Microsoft).****** [asterisks added]
>
> sounds about right. except for the exam providing minimal experience.
> Exams don't provide experience with a product, it's the other way round.
> If you have experience you will be successful with the exam.
>
> --
> Neil MCNGP#30 (MCSE2003)
>
> - Just because I don't care doesn't meant I don't understand.

MikeF

"Ben" <> wrote in message
news:#...
> Personally I think the exam should be more practical based. e.g. you get a
> virtual PC, plus maybe a server, and a problem is setup inside that
virtual
> network. Then its down to experiance to troubleshoot and fix that problem!
> You'd gain points for each troubleshooting step taken i.e. 2 systems,
unable
> to communicate, so you ping loopback - 1 point, ping the local ip - 1
point,
> ping the gateway - 1 point etc... I think a practical would be a) test
your
> skills and experiance better, 2) be more fun, as you wouldn't have to read
> 27 pages of text relating to the scenario, you could just get on with
fixing
> it, and c) be harder to brain dump, as people wouldn't be able to go in
and
> just copy down all the questions to sell on the internet!
>

i think you've highlighted problems with the new approach. MSFT has
indicated they're going to grade on the method you use to solve the problem,
not just solve/not solve (the better way).

but grading the method can lead to pure subjectivity. e.g., your example:
what you ping first could depend on your experience with the network. say
you worked at a place that just hired a new "Router God." you would
probably first ping the far end, then the near end, of the router. but if
you were "supposed" to ping the localhost first, you could lose points.

and, how is this hard to braindump? if anything, it seems easier: the
dumper just writes down the steps: ping this, ping that, ping the next thing
and so on.
or cuts and pastes from windows help.

Or, after wading through a half page of text, your problem turns out to be
to add Consuela and Jaime to a group from the command line. Question
designed to be slightly tricky, making you think of using dsadd rather than
dsmod; but other than that, the difficulty is remembering the syntax
(gddammm! is it a dash or a slash here) and avoiding typos.

that would be pretty easy to dump. granted, the problems could be more
involved, but that just means a longer dump.

an advantage to the new method _might_ be that the questions become more
concrete, rerducing the number of extremely bizzarre scenarios. like, for
example, some of those occurring in the designing directory services exam
for Win2K. or perhaps now, from what the OP said, some of those in 292.
(having blanked my memory to avoid inadvertently violating the NDA, i can't
remember _any_ questions from 292. i got a "pass." i felt severely
insulted. i expected a check for $50,000.)

obviously, this is just speculation; i haven't seen any of the actual
questions.

Mike









>
> "Neil" <guess!!!@gmail.com> wrote in message
> news:Xns960473E175393neilmcsegmailcom@207.46.248.1 6...
> > did you hear "Charles Lehmann" <>
> > say in news:4219fcb1$0$3413$:
> >
> > > I fell that the only good reasons for passing these certifications
> > > are: 1) Intellectual satisfaction, 2) Proof that one is still able to
> > > learn and pass exams and 3) Proving a minimal level of knowledge (and
> > > NOT experience as claimed by Microsoft).
> >
> > sounds about right. except for the exam providing minimal experience.
> > Exams don't provide experience with a product, it's the other way round.
> > If you have experience you will be successful with the exam.
> >
> > --
> > Neil MCNGP#30 (MCSE2003)
> >
> > - Just because I don't care doesn't meant I don't understand.
>
>

MikeF

did you hear "Ben" <> say in news:
#:

> Personally I think the exam should be more practical based.

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/mc...ns/default.asp

--
Neil MCNGP#30

- SPECIMEN: An Italian astronaut.

Neil

did you hear "MikeF" <> say in
news::

>
> eyes glazed over from the weekend?
>
>

feh, appearently so. no please be quiet while I go back to sleep

--
Neil MCNGP#30

- Does the name Pavlov ring a bell?

Neil

did you hear "MikeF" <> say in
news::

> i expected a check for $50,000.
>

oh, yeah...ummmm. me too! where's my check...

--
Neil MCNGP#30

- SPECIMEN: An Italian astronaut.

Neil

> Personally I think the exam should be more practical based. e.g. you get a
> virtual PC, plus maybe a server, and a problem is setup inside that
> virtual
> network. Then its down to experiance to troubleshoot and fix that problem!
> You'd gain points for each troubleshooting step taken i.e. 2 systems,
> unable
> to communicate, so you ping loopback - 1 point, ping the local ip - 1
> point,
> ping the gateway - 1 point etc... I think a practical would be a) test
> your
> skills and experiance better, 2) be more fun, as you wouldn't have to read
> 27 pages of text relating to the scenario, you could just get on with
> fixing
> it, and c) be harder to brain dump, as people wouldn't be able to go in
> and
> just copy down all the questions to sell on the internet!
>
>
So what? Who has REALLY implemented and maintained Certificate authority,
Terminal server, IIS, Clusters, EFS, DFS, VSS, Software distribution through
GPOs, SUS, ... and all the bells and whistles Microsoft is claiming....
Who has REALLY implemented all the functions and goodies that one is
measured up on the certification tests.
I might be off subject... but here in central Europe, I do NOT BELIEVE that
every MCSE has implemented and maintained all the goodies one is tested
against for the upgrade examinations...
Therefore what is the purpose of testing every possible feature and claim
that the testing is against experience? I think that is WRONG!
Either Microsoft claims that the testing is against experience and the tests
should be conducted in a Cisco CCIE manner where an expert is looking over
your shoulders. Or Microsoft should revise their certification strategies
claiming that what is being tested is not experience but knowledge.
Sorry of being a bit "biting"... but I think that there is a
misunderstanding about the certification purposes.

Charles Lehmann

Charles Lehmann