CompTIA A+ v's Mcsa

zale

I am in the process of choosing a course to be done online. I'm new to the IT scene and stumbled upon the CompTIA course and thought it was what i was looking for then seen this forum mention Mcsa.

What I want to know is, am I on the right track with CompTIA or is there much of a difference between the two.

Or is there another someone could suggest, whichever one I do is not being done as a career choice YET, it's really just for myself (something to do & I dig computers):)

Any input is appreciated.

This is what you should do.

First take the A+eaam. This is computer machanics and is a good intrduction. Then take comptia network plus. This is an introduction to networking. If you sit both of these exams you will only have to do three exams for your msca. I have done all of these exams:)

zale

Thanks for that, does it matter who I do it with (i.e. the course provider) or are they all the same. In that I mean same modules, support and price.

Ruu_Old

You can do the A+ with Fás or what I done was, learn the material myself and got some hands on experience at a local computer shop at the same time. I'm sure there are others but the exam fees are the same I think. Then you can take the test at a test center. You can locate test centres with Pearson VUE or Thomson Prometric. Best of luck.

Moonbeam

They are completely different!

Which a[[eals to you more?

A+ is alot shorter and easier.

Maybe do A+ first then go on and do some mcps

mick.fr

MCSA is good but there are too many of them out there.
And usually their technical level is not that great, because of a few factors :-)
If you want to make the difference in this industry, you should also concentrate of things that are not popular like Unix for example.
I can see sometimes in Dublin people working on Sun Solaris for example and being paid 500 euros a day just to install servers, clustering and other basic stuffs.
A basic MCSA will hardly go over 200 euros.

zale

Thanks for all the help,

I'm going to do the comp TIA course online for starters, is there a good book I could get, I presume the online content is enough, I'm just looking for something to refer back to after (I've a big loaf of bread but not everything's going to stay in);)

mick.fr

A+/N+ are pretty simple but will require a lot of reading and memorising.
Basically for the exam you will need to learn by heart all about PC IRQ addressing, network topologies, protocols, hardware (Switch, router, gateway...), OSI model...

I do not know the online ressource you are talking about, try to have a look at the content and compare it to what you could find in a book's shops.
I have seen some good books available at Easons and Borders.

Those exams, will give you an excellent base to understand the PC, network architectures, protocols, harware, wires types.
So it is a really good beginning.

And for god sake if somebody proposes you to get some cheating material such as Testking or so to pass the exam, kindly refuse, cause if you focus on this only, this is going to play against you sooner or later.

I have meet plenty of guys with some MCP and other certifications that they get only by learning the official questions/responses. Those guys are pretty useless and even dangerous to their own employer by the technical mistakes they are doing or did due to a serious lack of knowledge.

So if you want to become good and reliable work hard, practice, read a lot.
This is what is hopefuly making the difference between the real and fake MCP/A+/N+ whatever guys.

Ginger

The number of MCSAs worldwide is about 138,000 on Windows 2000 and 61000 on 2003 as of bout March last year

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/mcp/certified.mspx

mick.fr

Ginger wrote:

The number of MCSAs worldwide is about 138,000 on Windows 2000 and 61000 on 2003 as of bout March last year

http://www.microsoft.com/learning/mcp/certified.mspx

Yeah thanks Tesk*** lol

Ginger

Oookkaaaay?

Pablod

Hey Everyone,

I was going to ask a lot of Questions on the A+, but seen a lot of the answers here, so phewwww,thanks.
Anyway I still have one Question,
I am starting the A+ next week in a class, the Long Distance Learning didn't take my fancy.

My Q is, do you need to do any other Courses or training before you take the A+ course,
I have a bit of experience on Computers and Networks, (im known as the IT guy in the office) but have had no actual training.


Cheers,
P;)

Shad0r

The A+ is a vendor neutral PC hardware/OS certification. If you dont know very much about computers this is a good course for you.

The MCSA is a more advanced certification track. If you know nothing about PC's and/or networks this is going to be a massively uphill certification for you.

I work in the training industry so if you would like to have a chat with a technical trainer about the difference drop me an email and I'll set it up.

Neil

galactus

Shad0r wrote:

The A+ is a vendor neutral PC hardware/OS certification. If you dont know very much about computers this is a good course for you.

Not being smart, I honestly don't know, but have they added *nix or MAC onto A+ yet?

Shad0r

galactus wrote:

Not being smart, I honestly don't know, but have they added *nix or MAC onto A+ yet?

There is a brand new curriculum out for the A+

You can get details of it here:
http://certification.comptia.org/a/