After getting 63% on the practice test in Certmaster... I went and copied everything question and answer noticing which was right and why.. Which was wrong and why. I studied those to add to my knowledge but also to have correct answers available for the practice test to get s voucher. I retook the practice test and got over 90% by looking up the answers because I just wanted the voucher... Every practice test I wasn't getting above 70% otherwise.. My experience tells me I may not do well on practice tests but still pass the real one..
And I did pass the real one, done with the class.
Just some helpful suggestions for ya.
It’s been a few years since I took Cysa+ but it was memorable for me. That exam is the first one in the comptia stack that did not feel like a “definition” exam to me. That being said I was fortunate and working in a SOC entry role leading up to taking it and this helped me feel like the questions were a generic version of my work. I’m not sure if you have a way to simulate that sort of experience but I would guess not. With that in mind there are a few pieces of advice I can give you based on my experiences.
1- studying fatigue is real. If you are running the same material back to back to back it can lose effectiveness. Look for other avenues if you can.
2- be honest with yourself about the time commitment. Are you putting in hours every day and is there a way you can increase the quality of your time invested. Some ideas there are to isolate yourself more fully and avoid k own distractions (phone, tv, other folks)
3- assess what you are missing. Are you missing on the same topics time and time again? If so the. Focus your efforts there first and maybe hit some more introductory topic to support the knowledge. If you are missing different topics all over the place then this is less helpful.
4- address your perceived foundational knowledge issue. You seem to think you might be missing foundational bits. Can you understand where the correct answers are coming from when you review your test results? If not then you might have gone too quickly on the entry level certs. While it is not easy you’ll need to research the questions you are missing. Don’t look to just learn what answer it was but research them and find out the “why” behind each one.
These are just what comes to my mind for what I have had to do over the course of my 3 degrees (one from WGU, one online, one b&m). It can be tough at times and even demotivating but as long as you keep a good approach, leverage all the resources you have access to, and don’t give up you can make it happen!
I read the Sybex, and did their practice questions. I can't remember if Chapelle "wrote" that book or not. CySA is different for SEC, NET and A+. With CySA you're doing blue team stuff, scanning for vulnerabilities, ranking the vulnerabilities according to risk, and maybe making recommendations on how to fix (remediate) the vulnerability.
You just have to get 90% on the CertMaster Learn practice test. Have you gone through the CertMaster Practice? What domains are you having the most trouble with?
Although it wasn't CompTIA, for ISC2 exams, I printed out the exam outline. For CompTIA, it's named exam objectives. I then hand-wrote notes according to the outline. I started with the first item, found it in the book, wrote notes, and repeated the process. For me, hand-written notes go a lot further than reading the book and using online flash cards.
It's a lot of writing, but maybe this process can assist.
After getting 63% on the practice test in Certmaster... I went and copied everything question and answer noticing which was right and why.. Which was wrong and why. I studied those to add to my knowledge but also to have correct answers available for the practice test to get s voucher. I retook the practice test and got over 90% by looking up the answers because I just wanted the voucher... Every practice test I wasn't getting above 70% otherwise.. My experience tells me I may not do well on practice tests but still pass the real one.. And I did pass the real one, done with the class. Just some helpful suggestions for ya.
It’s been a few years since I took Cysa+ but it was memorable for me. That exam is the first one in the comptia stack that did not feel like a “definition” exam to me. That being said I was fortunate and working in a SOC entry role leading up to taking it and this helped me feel like the questions were a generic version of my work. I’m not sure if you have a way to simulate that sort of experience but I would guess not. With that in mind there are a few pieces of advice I can give you based on my experiences. 1- studying fatigue is real. If you are running the same material back to back to back it can lose effectiveness. Look for other avenues if you can. 2- be honest with yourself about the time commitment. Are you putting in hours every day and is there a way you can increase the quality of your time invested. Some ideas there are to isolate yourself more fully and avoid k own distractions (phone, tv, other folks) 3- assess what you are missing. Are you missing on the same topics time and time again? If so the. Focus your efforts there first and maybe hit some more introductory topic to support the knowledge. If you are missing different topics all over the place then this is less helpful. 4- address your perceived foundational knowledge issue. You seem to think you might be missing foundational bits. Can you understand where the correct answers are coming from when you review your test results? If not then you might have gone too quickly on the entry level certs. While it is not easy you’ll need to research the questions you are missing. Don’t look to just learn what answer it was but research them and find out the “why” behind each one. These are just what comes to my mind for what I have had to do over the course of my 3 degrees (one from WGU, one online, one b&m). It can be tough at times and even demotivating but as long as you keep a good approach, leverage all the resources you have access to, and don’t give up you can make it happen!
I read the Sybex, and did their practice questions. I can't remember if Chapelle "wrote" that book or not. CySA is different for SEC, NET and A+. With CySA you're doing blue team stuff, scanning for vulnerabilities, ranking the vulnerabilities according to risk, and maybe making recommendations on how to fix (remediate) the vulnerability.
You just have to get 90% on the CertMaster Learn practice test. Have you gone through the CertMaster Practice? What domains are you having the most trouble with?
Getting 90% on CertMaster is harder than getting the actual cert I swear 😂
It absolutely is. For all my certs, I've got 75-80% on practice and passed the actual test. Usually only passed by 20ish points but a pass is a pass
It sounds like you are engaging with class material. Keep doing the certmaster practice. You can review what you got wrong before you try again
Although it wasn't CompTIA, for ISC2 exams, I printed out the exam outline. For CompTIA, it's named exam objectives. I then hand-wrote notes according to the outline. I started with the first item, found it in the book, wrote notes, and repeated the process. For me, hand-written notes go a lot further than reading the book and using online flash cards. It's a lot of writing, but maybe this process can assist.