Certification Prep – The 20 Minute Workout

With respect to my prior post regarding the pulling of the 83 series of exams but finding some conflicting information, I was able to get in touch with Tjeerd Veninga at Microsoft who is the SR MARKETING MANAGER MCT and he forwarded me the following:   Delivery of 83-640 was suspended in June; we currently don’t have any Howler versions in market (83 is the channel code for our lab based exams). Because this exam earns the same certification as 70-640, candidates who search for 83-640 are directed to the 70-640 information. The blog post that you found was an old one that predates our announcement to suspend delivery of this exam. The blog with the details on the suspension can be found here: http://borntolearn.mslearn.net/btl/b/weblog/archive/2010/06/01/we-re-taking-action-based-on-your-feedback.aspx We hope to have more news later as we do continue to believe the performance based tests are a great way to test skills.   And so there you have it!

Microsoft has released article 976932 which reviews the details and additional information regarding Service Pack 1 Beta for Windows 7 and for Windows Server 2008 R2. For professional and enterprise consumers that are interested in downloading the beta it can be downloaded from the Microsoft Technet website . End users are not encouraged to use the beta installation. Microsoft has indicated “This early release of Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 Beta is not available for home users. The SP1 Beta does not provide new end-user features, and installation is not supported by Microsoft.” You must be running the Release to Manufacturing (RTM) version of Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 in order to download and install the Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 Beta. Professional and enterprise customers can learn more about piloting, deploying and managing Windows 7 by visiting the Springboard Series on TechNet . There is a technical overview whitepaper of the Wind...

Originally released in 2008 the 83 dash series of exams was introduced by Microsoft to replace the standard format of exams that had been delivered by the 70 dash series. The 70 dash series of exams, like 70-680 for Windows 7, Configuring, are set up as multiple choice, hot area, sort and order type questions in a standardized format. Very little has changed in these exams over the past 12 or so years. (My first Microsoft exam was 70-064 Implementing and Supporting Windows 95). The 83 series was supposed to be a change up in the test delivery by offering the examinee part of the exam as lab based. There are still some traditional 70 dash based questions but a good portion of the exam format is lab based. At some point the exams were on hold, as you can note as evident from http://www.microsoft.com/learning/en/us/exam.aspx?ID=83-640&locale=en-us where they push you back to the 70-640 exam Having said that, there are posts on the Born to Learn blog http://borntolearn.msle...

Even though you may be strapped for time, ongoing training can greatly impact your professional development. I wholeheartedly agree with this; as a matter of fact, my entire career in information technology is rooted on this premise. Changes in technology and the IT industry happen quickly, so you must keep up to date with new trends and developments as they emerge if you hope to remain at the forefront of the field. Pursuing training on an ongoing basis also can help your job security Please read the entire article The Case for Ongoing Training as posted on the Certification Magazine website

For those of you that are like me and tie your Hotmail account to Outlook, the Outlook connector has been a good friend. Recently, Microsoft has released version 14.0 to replace version 12.1 The newly released Outlook Hotmail Connector 14.0 is compatible with Outlook 2003, 2007, and 2010. I have a new post up on the Toolbox for IT website titled Microsoft Outlook Hotmail Connector 14.0 Tutorial Walk-through that will walk you through the steps you need to take in order to install or upgrade to a newer version of the Microsoft Outlook Hotmail Connector. As always, I’m interested in your feedback so feel free to drop me a note and let me know your thoughts.

With all of the enhancements that Windows 7 offers over Windows XP there are a number of netbook owners that are interested in migrating their systems to Windows 7. Because of the hardware demands of Windows Vista, netbooks had been primarily released running Windows XP. Once Windows 7 came on the scene, Windows 7 Starter Edition had been made available for use (primarily) on these systems. I have a new post up on the Toolbox for IT website titled Windows 7 Starter Edition Netbook Installation that will walk you through the steps you need to take in order to prepare media for a Windows 7 Starter Edition Netbook Installation by using the Windows 7 USB/DVD Download tool. As always, I’m interested in your feedback so feel free to drop me a note and let me know your thoughts.

Hi gang – I’m back. I’ve been on hiatus for the past month Saving Wallingford’s Fireworks . They’re saved and now I can get back to doing some technology blogging. I’ll be at TechEd North America 2010 in New Orleans in a week as well; I am sure I’ll have some things to post from there. As an MCT, I am going to be helping out at the Hands-on-Lab (HOL) area. If you’re going to be there feel free to stop by and say “hi”.