How to Prepare for an Exam

Preparing for any MCSE-related test (including Exam 70-284) requires that you obtain and study materials designed to provide comprehensive information about the product and its capabilities that will appear on the specific exam for which you are preparing. The following list of materials can help you study and prepare:

• The Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit, (Microsoft Press, 2003). The Resource Kit can also be accessed online at www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/techinfo/reskit/resourcekit.mspx.

• Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 Administrator's Companion, (Microsoft Press, 2003).

• The exam-preparation materials, practice tests, and self-assessment exams on the Microsoft Training and Services page, at www.microsoft.com/traincert. The Exam Resources link offers examples of the new question types found on the MCSE exams. You should find the materials, download them, and use them!

• The exam-preparation advice, practice tests, questions of the day, and discussion groups on the www.examcram2.com e-learning and certification destination Web site.

• Study guides. Several publishers, including Que Publishing, offer certification titles. Que Publishing offers the following:

  • The Exam Cram 2 series These books give you information about the material you need to know to pass the tests.

  • The MCSE Training Guide series These books provide a greater level of detail than the Exam Cram 2 books and are designed to teach you everything you need to know about the subject covered by an exam. Each book comes with a CD-ROM that contains interactive practice exams in a variety of testing formats.

  Together, these two series make a perfect pair.

• Classroom training. CTECs, online partners, and third-party training companies (such as New Horizons, ECPI, and Entré) all offer classroom training on Exchange Server 2003. These companies aim to help you prepare to pass Exam 70-284 (or other exams). Although such training runs upward of $350 per day in class, most of the individuals lucky enough to partake usually find this training to be worthwhile.

• Other publications. There's no shortage of available materials about Exchange Server 2003. The "Need to Know More?" resource sections at the end of each chapter in this book give you an idea of where we think you should look for further discussion.

This set of required and recommended materials represents a wide variety of sources and resources for Exchange Server 2003 and related topics. We hope you'll find that this book belongs in this company.

What This Book Will Not Do

This book will not teach you everything you need to know about computers or even about a given topic. Nor is this book an introduction to computer technology. If you're new to Windows administration and looking for an initial preparation guide, check out www.quepublishing.com, where you will find a whole section dedicated to the MCSE certifications. This book reviews what you need to know before you take the test, with the fundamental purpose dedicated to reviewing the information needed on the Microsoft 70-284 certification exam.

This book uses a variety of teaching and memorization techniques to analyze the exam-related topics and to provide you with ways to input, index, and retrieve everything you'll need to know to pass the test. Once again, it is not an introduction to Windows administration.

What This Book Is Designed to Do

This book is designed to be read as a pointer to the areas of knowledge on which you will be tested. In other words, you might want to read the book one time, just to get an insight into how comprehensive your knowledge of computers is. The book is also designed to be read shortly before you go for the actual test and to give you a useful review in as few pages as possible. We think you can use this book to get a sense of the underlying context of any topic in the chapters or to skim-read for Exam Alerts, bulleted points, summaries, and topic headings.

We've drawn on material from Microsoft's own listing of knowledge requirements, from other preparation guides, and from the exams themselves. We've also drawn from a battery of third-party, test-preparation tools and technical Web sites, as well as from our own experience with Windows administration and the exam. Our aim is to walk you through the knowledge you will need looking over your shoulder, so to speak and point out those things that are important for the exam (Exam Alerts, practice questions, and so on).

Exam 70-284 makes a basic assumption that you already have a strong background of experience with the Exchange Server 2003 and Windows Server 2003 products and their applicable terminology. On the other hand, because Exchange Server 2003 is so new, no one can be a complete expert. We've tried to demystify the jargon, acronyms, terms, and concepts. Also, wherever we think you're likely to blur past an important concept, we've defined the assumptions and premises behind that concept.