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October 13th, 2004, 03:53 PM
#1
Registered User
Certification and Retired!
I wonder if I am the oldest Certification candidate in the UK who is not working in IT and indeed I am long retired being a carer to my disabled husband. I am 63.
I am very lucky because my local College has become a Microsoft Academy and my old City and Guilds Networking level 3 tutor is now an MCT and running the class. I get full fee remission and an access fund pays for my materials. All I pay is thirty quid College Registration fee. My tutor is very supportive too. I have had problems settling into the course and suffered early burnout and went off the idea for a while but some honest emails between myself and the tutor and a quick chat with him today has restored my faith in my ability to succeed.
Furthermore, I emailed the tutor this evening with a question about installing the eval copy of Server 2003 in the resource kit which I need to do the labs and so on and he came right back within a minute or so - how's that for support and I have created the new NTFS primary partition and am ready to instal. I will then use the XP partition my other computer as a client for practice. The fun comes when I get my new computer and can run two clients!
Funny, I was really down yesterday but now I am really looking forward to the rest of the course and even the exams - is this normal for MCSE candidates?
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October 13th, 2004, 09:34 PM
#2
Registered User
Are you related to Noo Noo?
Sergeant WOTPP
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October 14th, 2004, 01:09 AM
#3
Geezer
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October 14th, 2004, 01:13 AM
#4
Registered User
I was making a joke. I know they are not related. But there stories seem similar to me.
Relax
And before you flame me, I have the utmost respect for Noo and Morse. I think the schooling that they are taking is great...
Sergeant WOTPP
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October 14th, 2004, 02:28 AM
#5
Geezer
No need for big writing dude, I was trying to explain that this topic is linked to others & then answer her & you at once .. a recuring theme in those has been 'how did you get funding ? I couldn't find any' ..
I think its fantastic too that morselady has the energy, I did my MCSE in my twenties & my degree in my thirties & now I'm nearly .. well older
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October 14th, 2004, 05:29 AM
#6
Registered User
Originally Posted by MobilePCPhysician
Are you related to Noo Noo?
No, why do you ask?
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October 14th, 2004, 05:52 AM
#7
Registered User
I have to say that I am a lazy bastard that started MCSE W2k and gave up after the second exam.
I found it quicker to learn by practice as opposed to theory. That is a personal choice on my part though and I have always been rubbish at taking exams etc.
I think the way you are approaching this is good though MorseLady. You have the courses and support from the tutor and you have a real live W2k3 Server to play with as well which will be of enormous help to get your head round the "theory" and put it into practice.
Good luck and you always know you can pop in here and ask questions / opinions on any "issues" you may have!
emr
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October 14th, 2004, 05:57 AM
#8
Registered User
Last edited by MorseLady; October 14th, 2004 at 07:47 AM.
Reason: Too long and to correct errors
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October 14th, 2004, 08:48 AM
#9
Registered User
Kudos on taking this on. There is no age limit in IT, and I hope you do well in a field you obviously enjoy.
Tip: Consider getting VirtualPC or VMWare installed on a powerful PC if you don't have the room or money to get a real lab set up. You can then configure a virtual LAN on a single machine and be able to work out your problems and test scenarios all from one machine. Just make sure it has as much RAM as ou can afford.
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October 14th, 2004, 03:31 PM
#10
Registered User
Originally Posted by GreenGrime
Kudos on taking this on. There is no age limit in IT, and I hope you do well in a field you obviously enjoy.
Tip: Consider getting VirtualPC or VMWare installed on a powerful PC if you don't have the room or money to get a real lab set up. You can then configure a virtual LAN on a single machine and be able to work out your problems and test scenarios all from one machine. Just make sure it has as much RAM as ou can afford.
Thanks GreenGrime. I have two machines at the moment and have just reinstalled Server 2003 on this one and I now have it dual booting happily with XP. I will stick with the Windows Boot Manager and not go upsetting it with Powerquest again. Now I can do some work and I have a smaller machine with ME and XP on which I can use as client. When I buy my new machine with 3GHZ or better processor and 1GB RAM and a big hard drive or maybe two I will put Server 2003 on it and this one will become another client.
Now to get down to some serious study to try and catch up with the group
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October 15th, 2004, 02:24 AM
#11
Registered User
Originally Posted by MorseLady
Thanks GreenGrime. I have two machines at the moment and have just reinstalled Server 2003 on this one and I now have it dual booting happily with XP. I will stick with the Windows Boot Manager and not go upsetting it with Powerquest again. Now I can do some work and I have a smaller machine with ME and XP on which I can use as client. When I buy my new machine with 3GHZ or better processor and 1GB RAM and a big hard drive or maybe two I will put Server 2003 on it and this one will become another client.
Now to get down to some serious study to try and catch up with the group
MorseLady you go girl ! enjoy yourself remember we only live once and good luck
What dont kill you only makes you stronger!!!!!
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October 15th, 2004, 02:24 PM
#12
Driver Terrier
Originally Posted by MobilePCPhysician
Are you related to Noo Noo?
I wish! I would be proud to have MorseLady in my family.
MorseLady, I have fallen into cisco by accident. The college are short a couple of tutors - I am pretty good with hardware so I am useful in lab lessons. But to teach I have to pass all these exams, the college are pushing me through what the kids are doing, plus the teachers stuff. This may all come to a grinding halt at Christmas, but I hope not.
What I find amazing is the minutiae that the IT essentials exams call for... for instance, having to remember the i/o addresses for parallel and com ports - it's not like you can't look up this kind of stuff in the bios!! Also socket names for 286 upwards....fortunately they stop at 478s!
Any whooo if you get any sort of enjoyment out of it (yes even the masochistic enjoyment after going 10 rounds with windows) then keep going. But for goodness sake, the damn thing is only a gadget and it's supposed to be fun!
Never, ever approach a computer saying or even thinking "I will just do this quickly."
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October 16th, 2004, 04:03 AM
#13
Geezer
Making IT fun is hard to do, lousey material ..
Originally Posted by NooNoo
..What I find amazing is the minutiae that the IT essentials exams call for... for instance, having to remember the i/o addresses for parallel and com ports - it's not like you can't look up this kind of stuff in the bios!! Also socket names for 286 upwards....yes even the masochistic enjoyment after going 10 rounds with windows..
Hijacking MorseLadies thread slightly ... which one are you doing wants this info ? (I think I had to know that for A+ about 10 years ago !) - this is one of the 'violent objections' I have to standard exams, knowing useless things, because once upon a time they were important .. (not that you ever needed to know this off the top of your head unless buying them imho) - I think whats important in IT is problem solving & ability to apply knowledge however aquired, but stubborn goes a long way especially if you are 'partial' to a little of it .
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October 16th, 2004, 05:56 AM
#14
Registered User
Originally Posted by confus-ed
I think whats important in IT is problem solving & ability to apply knowledge however aquired, but stubborn goes a long way especially if you are 'partial' to a little of it .
Agreed. I wish they could test this in some way, maybe with a test suite of servers/workstations etc. Trouble is exam costs would quadruple!
There's no panic like the panic you momentarily feel when you've got
your hand or head stuck in something
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October 16th, 2004, 07:45 AM
#15
Geezer
I honestly think you should test open book as well as practically, so that means internet access, but that means anyone who can find a decent help site can get whatever exam - if you could factor in just using google somehow (& just that - so no helpers) I think that'd be pretty fair, but then again blagging it out of some internet nerds like us is I guess equally valid as long as it gets the job done, so what value any certification whatsoever ?, its only a pointer to what a reasonably bright person should be able to solve, but sometimes you need a better thinker than 'knower' - its 'the appliance of science' & all that, I think though that makes a good tech, as things change so quickly anyway, most places, you are constantly in flux & not everyone can know everything, you have to learn as you go ..
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