Often, students don't think to check on a painfully important area - the way the company divides up the courseware elements, and into what particular chunks. You may think it logical (with training often lasting 2 or 3 years to gain full certified status,) that a training provider will issue the training stage by stage, as you achieve each exam pass. Although: What if you don't finish every single section? Maybe the prescribed order won't suit you? Due to no fault of yours, you may go a little slower and not get all the study materials as a result.

To be straight, the perfect answer is to have a copy of their prescribed order of study, but make sure you have all of your learning modules right from the beginning. Meaning you've got it all in case you don't finish as fast as they'd like.

In first place for the biggest issue to be got round for IT students can be attending multi-day workshops. Most certification companies wax lyrical on the so-called 'benefits' of these classes, it's almost certain though that you'll find them a growing difficulty due to:

- All the travelling required - multiple trips and often over 100 miles a pop.

- Taking time off work - most schools will only provide Monday to Friday workshop availability and group several days in a chunk. This isn't ideal for most people who work, even more so if travelling time is added into the mix.

- Holiday days lost - most trainees get just four weeks holiday each year. If you give up at least half to your educational classes, you haven't got a great deal of holiday time remaining for the family as a whole.

- Classes normally become way too big.

- Tension can be created in mixed classes because most students want to move at a pace comfortable for them.

- Take into account all of all the travel, fares, parking, accommodation and food and you may be surprised (and not pleasantly). Students have reported extra costs of between several hundred and a couple of thousand pounds. Do the maths - and understand where they're coming from.

- Most trainees want to keep their training private to avoid any kind of repercussions in their work.

- Raising questions in a class full of students often makes any one of us a little nervous. Ever avoided asking a question just because you didn't want to appear stupid?

- For those who have work away from home, you face the added difficulty that workshops can become impossible to get to - unfortunately however, they've been paid for in advance.

To find a more flexible route, employ pre-filmed classes at the location of your choice - studying at your own pace, when it suits you - not someone else. Ponder this... If you have a laptop you're able to work absolutely anywhere you want (within reason!) And 24x7 support is only a web-browser click away in case of difficulty. Repeat any modules as often as you want - doing something over will help you remember it. And you don't have to worry about any note-taking - it's already prepared ready. Although this can't completely stop every single problem, it unquestionably makes things easier, simpler and less stressful. You've also got less costs, travel and hassle.

It is generally acknowledged that it should take around 300 to 350 hours to study for the MCSA, and approximately two hundred hrs more for the 'MCSE', assuming you have access to top-notch multimedia training, plus outstanding help and support facilities and exam preparation. Assuming you have experience you might reasonably do your training in your free time and secure your accreditations within a year. When you new to the I.T. community though, think about starting with 'Comptia' 'A+' & 'Network+' first. Particulars of these qualifications can be found on their individual pages on this site, however this will add two hundred hours or 6 months of part-time training onto the whole thing, perhaps even longer.

Two specialist subjects also exist in the MCSE track; that of Messaging & Security. This sometimes necessitates an additional 2 MCPs, or an additional 1 subject to which ones were picked out from the first seven. It seems sensible to think about this from the very start if you're interested in either of these areas, because a bit of forward-planning will mean you have a maximum of eight MCP's to sit. Up-grade exams have also been brought out by 'Microsoft', (exam 70/648 for the 'MCSA' & exam 70-649 for MCSE) for Server 2008 'MCTS' ('Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist'). It's sensible to look at including one of these updates (or an equivalent) as quickly as possible. This will not only future proof you to some degree, but will also open up further job alternatives.