Man of Honour
- Joined
- 17 Nov 2003
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- 36,749
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- Southampton, UK
Oh dear. You didn't do it through these TV ads did you? I find most people that get these certs have very little real knowledge
FAO System Builders/Technicians etc
- Thread starter Happy
- Start date
Oh dear. You didn't do it through these TV ads did you? I find most people that get these certs have very little real knowledge
Oh dear. You didn't do it through these TV ads did you? I find most people that get these certs have very little real knowledge
No, this was a residential course to get the basic knowledge and you walk out with a City and Guilds thing. Then was lucky enough to get a job doing networking and got my MCSE and then moved onto CCNA then CCNP.
I am lucky enough to really enjoy my line of work and the wage is quite nice as well.
2 bits of advice:
a) once a hobby becomes your job it stops being a hobby (i.e. fun)
b) while you may like the idea of building computers every day, it's guaranteed you will get fed up with doing it day in day out, as it's pretty brain-dead once you have the basics.
a) once a hobby becomes your job it stops being a hobby (i.e. fun)
b) while you may like the idea of building computers every day, it's guaranteed you will get fed up with doing it day in day out, as it's pretty brain-dead once you have the basics.
Man of Honour
- Joined
- 17 Nov 2003
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- 36,749
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- Southampton, UK
No, this was a residential course to get the basic knowledge and you walk out with a City and Guilds thing. Then was lucky enough to get a job doing networking and got my MCSE and then moved onto CCNA then CCNP.
I am lucky enough to really enjoy my line of work and the wage is quite nice as well.
I'm still a bit dubious to whether someone can learn all this to a decent level in such a short time. Maybe because I've been in education for this for the last 5 years...
Man of Honour
- Joined
- 17 Nov 2003
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- 36,749
- Location
- Southampton, UK
heh...yeah, don't want to be in the same boat I'm in after 5 years + !!! Crap pay, and boring job now.
I started off building systems like the OP wants to do, and yes, its fun, then I went into Server builds, then I started testing everything (Servers / desktops etc...) And now as well as the above I do our Cabinet installs...
But the lack of work, and same systems makes it kinda boring now to say the least, and maybe the fact I've been there way to long, and the pay sucks.
Food for thought.
Associate
- Joined
- 5 Jun 2007
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- 299
If your maths is good (is it?) you could maybe do ee. That's mostly hardware I think.
I'm lucky enough to work in a job that covers system building that actually pays very well and is actually interesting. (well ok for the job 30k+)
The company is a Telecoms Software house but job includes sourcing reliable / fast hardware dependant on application, building, testing, config and despatch. Along with that fault finding, in house server / pc maint, tech support to onsite engineer monkeys etc etc... on occasion the job also entails setting up LANs / Hotspots in hotels with crazy VLAN configs on stacked switches (which is a real PITA, but a challenge, set up one this week with over 500 VLANs )
Also get to do the odd bit of coding in .net when the need arrises...
Perks of job... no management over us except company directors, work in own unit seperate from HQ and rest of staff, unlimited free home PC upgrades to test new systems long term.
Though building a PC can be done by anyone, building a well crafted / reliable rock solid system that must never fall over is another matter... but it's fun trying. I can hand on heart say I have never opened any PC and thought 'hey thats really nicely built' ...when we build them every system I send out the door I do so not caring if someone opened it up... they are that tidy.
I have no quals in computing, but basic quals in electronics, but that helps out when stripping laptops to fix...Anyway, not bragging rights, just saying that jobs do exist... they are just very rare but when you find them you stick with them, been at this place for 12 years
The company is a Telecoms Software house but job includes sourcing reliable / fast hardware dependant on application, building, testing, config and despatch. Along with that fault finding, in house server / pc maint, tech support to onsite engineer monkeys etc etc... on occasion the job also entails setting up LANs / Hotspots in hotels with crazy VLAN configs on stacked switches (which is a real PITA, but a challenge, set up one this week with over 500 VLANs
)Also get to do the odd bit of coding in .net when the need arrises...
Perks of job... no management over us except company directors, work in own unit seperate from HQ and rest of staff, unlimited free home PC upgrades to test new systems long term.
Though building a PC can be done by anyone, building a well crafted / reliable rock solid system that must never fall over is another matter... but it's fun trying. I can hand on heart say I have never opened any PC and thought 'hey thats really nicely built' ...when we build them every system I send out the door I do so not caring if someone opened it up... they are that tidy.
I have no quals in computing, but basic quals in electronics, but that helps out when stripping laptops to fix...Anyway, not bragging rights, just saying that jobs do exist... they are just very rare but when you find them you stick with them, been at this place for 12 years
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To see if I like the prospect of going back to college, I thinking of trying a CompTIA A+ Certification course, which would include CompTIA A+ Essentials and CompTIA A+ 220-602.
My feeling is that this type of course is still beneficial, and as it's part time, I don't have to make any full-time commitments that I make regret.
Has anyone ever done one of these courses? Or could this be a waste of time?
Cheers
My feeling is that this type of course is still beneficial, and as it's part time, I don't have to make any full-time commitments that I make regret.
Has anyone ever done one of these courses? Or could this be a waste of time?
Cheers
Soldato
- Joined
- 14 Feb 2004
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- 14,315
- Location
- Peoples Republic of Histonia, Cambridge
There are very few jobs around that involve building custom PCs. Most home/business PC are built on assembly lines and require very little skill or understanding of how PCs work. Custom PC are normally built by enthusiasts such as yourself who require little help because the like doing it themselves.
If building PCs is your hobby then just enjoy it for what it is. If you plan to make any money out of it you're probably going to find yourself disappointed.
If you want to earn a wage out of playing with hardware get a support job. However it's not that much fun and the pay isn't that great these days ether. I'd say your biggest problem here isn't a lack of qualifications, but a lack of commercial experience.
If building PCs is your hobby then just enjoy it for what it is. If you plan to make any money out of it you're probably going to find yourself disappointed.
If you want to earn a wage out of playing with hardware get a support job. However it's not that much fun and the pay isn't that great these days ether. I'd say your biggest problem here isn't a lack of qualifications, but a lack of commercial experience.
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I'm lucky enough to work in a job that covers system building that actually pays very well and is actually interesting. (well ok for the job 30k+)
The company is a Telecoms Software house but job includes sourcing reliable / fast hardware dependant on application, building, testing, config and despatch. Along with that fault finding, in house server / pc maint, tech support to onsite engineer monkeys etc etc... on occasion the job also entails setting up LANs / Hotspots in hotels with crazy VLAN configs on stacked switches (which is a real PITA, but a challenge, set up one this week with over 500 VLANs
Also get to do the odd bit of coding in .net when the need arrises...
Perks of job... no management over us except company directors, work in own unit seperate from HQ and rest of staff, unlimited free home PC upgrades to test new systems long term.
Though building a PC can be done by anyone, building a well crafted / reliable rock solid system that must never fall over is another matter... but it's fun trying. I can hand on heart say I have never opened any PC and thought 'hey thats really nicely built' ...when we build them every system I send out the door I do so not caring if someone opened it up... they are that tidy.
I have no quals in computing, but basic quals in electronics, but that helps out when stripping laptops to fix...Anyway, not bragging rights, just saying that jobs do exist... they are just very rare but when you find them you stick with them, been at this place for 12 years
Damn sounds awesome...
I can understand the wage if even a bit of .net is involved.
See, I work by neatess as well, I can't send stuff out the door if it looks naff =/...Practically every server we get from the server builder I tend to re-build...Cause some of the cabling is just madness.
MCP, MCSA, MCSE, CCNA in the order of easiest to hardest I would say. (If you start on the hard, the others will be much easier).
If you enjoy building computers through hardware then the Systems Engineer or Networking course may suit you more.
You can get DIY books from MS themselves that basically teach you all you need to know. They are about £30 each on average and for the later courses you will need 5/6 books to gain the qualification.
If you enjoy building computers through hardware then the Systems Engineer or Networking course may suit you more.
You can get DIY books from MS themselves that basically teach you all you need to know. They are about £30 each on average and for the later courses you will need 5/6 books to gain the qualification.