Hey y'all. I want to get A+ certified. I'm pretty interested in a Health Informatics program my state is offering. I didn't complete my college, only got halfway through my second year...and the program I want to get into requires some prior IT experience (i.e. a bachelors in IT stuff). I wasn't studying that, so I'm kind of stuck.

I was told though, that the A+ cert. is pretty much an automatic acceptance, so I've been looking into it. There's all kinds of resources out there, but I was wondering if any of you had some suggestions before I start throwing money around.

Maybe nobody knows. I certainly don't.

Holy shit are you glad I browsed the site and saw this. Well, I just so happened to have gotten my A+ back in December. So here's the thing: they updated the test this year to include Windows 7 and more modern hardware, but you lost out on the lifetime certification, so if you get it you have to recertify every couple of years to keep it. I didn't take any classes or anything to get it when I studied for it. I got Exam Cram for A+, watched Professor Messer's free Comptia A+ training videos, and googled as many A+ practice tests I could take (including the ones that come with the book I used). I got a 876 on Essentials and 900 (perfect score) on Practical Applications.

It took me about a month to study on my own and I took the tests within a week of eachother. The tests add up together to a little over $300, but if you use a reseller you can get test coupons that make it much cheaper.

In general, the A+ exam is geared towards a PC technician's job duties -- think help/service desk jobs. You'll basically have to know desktop/laptop/printer/basic networking hardware in a straight memorization fashion in addition to applying the troubleshooting methodology for both hardware and windows OS for light to moderately complex issues. Some examples of questions that they might test you on would include,

"What is the max distance that a 10BaseT networking cable can run without the use of a repeater?" Answer: 100m

"Which switch is used on the ping command to automatically ping until the user stops it?" Answer: -t

"A user calls the help desk and complains that their monitor keeps flickering on and off even though they haven't touched it. What is the FIRST thing you should do?" Answer: Ask the user open-ended question to identify the problem.

So, the difficulty ranges pretty randomly. In general though, if you stick with those books I recommended, and I'd even recommend Mike Meyer's A+ All in one Study Guide as well, then you'll be fine.

The only issue with A+ is that in some organizations its either a great gateway to something better or a complete lock in to helpdesk. If you want it just as an admissions requirement under your belt, then go for it. If you want to make a career doing something in a specific field of IT and that's the basis of you getting your A+, I'd recommend instead getting a CCNA cert or equivalent in whatever basis of IT you're looking into.

It really depends where you plan to go. =/
I can vouch for the fact that general-purpose tech support is a good way to get your foot in the tech door, but you'll need to show an interest to move beyond it. A lot of companies that have tech support departments have more specialized technical departments, or--like me--you might get lucky and be able to focus on another interest while in tech support.

I pretty much knew I wanted to be a programmer from the age of 8. Computer retail and technical support gave me a good IT basis, then I got my break when my tech support boss let me allocate some time towards programming Perl scripts to aid the department in various ways. With that little bit of professional programming under my built I was able to get my first programming job.

Getting certifications for networking will--in my opinion--only serve you well if your goal is to eventually head towards a focused networking job. Likewise, it only pays to know Microsoft products in and out if you'll eventually be working in a Windows environment. Otherwise a general knowledge of both will have the best cost-to-value ratio.

Mind you... this is coming from a person who has a lot of luck when it comes to jobs.

If you're into networking, you should see if there are any ISP-related tech centers around you. If my time with Global Crossing is any indication, you can get in doing network-related tech support on Windows and Mac OS's, then possibly move up to higher-tier, more networking-specializing departments once you get some experience under your belt.

That would have been my progression path had I not gotten the programming opportunity I did.