career advancment/moves

[darkmanx]

Hi all, first post here so hello to everyone.

I've been working in IT as a technician for around 3 years now and really want to move forward as its not really challenging me as much as i'd like. been put through a few courses by work ccna, active directory, network+ and we already have a couple of people dealing with the network side of the job here and thats more what i'd like to do.

can anyone suggest ways to gain more experience of the server side of it all as they are not to keen on training me up to do it as they have enough people to look after that side of things. Would it be work getting an old PC and setting up server2003 on it and setting up a small network at home to get to grips with how to build a network? No offence to anyone who's been a technician a long time but personally i want to move onwards and upwards. Not sure if work are keen on me gaining to much knowledge as they put me on the ccna course but wouldn't pay for the exam to get me certified.

Any suggestions would be grateful.
Cheers

 

[darkmanx]

cheers for the suggestions, does anyone know where there are any guides on setting up a virtual network or is it straightforward enough to ponder through?

what kind of things do you think it would be worth going through when setting up network? I was thinking

installing 2003
active directory
dchp/dns
making sure users can log onto domain etc setting up file sharing and profiles
maybe having a play with RIS to network build machine?
done quite a lot of software packaging and deploying through AD at work so could do that at home to fine tune my skills.

Also if i was to go on anymore courses at my current job any suggestions as to what would be good in my development? they wouldn't pay for vmware course for me, would exchange be useful?

Thanks very much for the input so far guys, I know i'm still fairly young?! (25) but I don't want to be left behind and have to just fix PC's and replace broken mice and keyboards for the rest of my days lol

 

[darkmanx]

cool cheers for that, I'm glad to hear there are other people in same situation as me. I did computing course when I was at college then when I left there were pretty much no IT jobs around here so ended up doing something else for 3 years then managed to get in as a trainee here. I didn't really fancy going to uni so everything I've learnt is on the job or on the courses i've done.

I guess I can be a bit impatient and want to learn everything faster but when I started work here they said they would teach me everything (as I was a trainee) but it's not really happened as they said it would! I guess they are happy to have someone who can get through all the jobs quick but I feel I need to do more and learn more just so I'm not bored.

any other things i've not thought of that might be useful?

 

[darkmanx]

cheers for the ideas guys some good feedback coming through. Does anyone know how much it would cost to get microsoft certified as I think I'd have to bankroll it myself as work wouldn't pay for me to become certified. Think becoming mcse would put me on par with my boss which I doubt he would want

 

[darkmanx]

so you can get away with buying the £90 set of books and learn your way through them and sit the exams as and when you are ready?

Would the training package cover all modules required to enable you to take all the exams?

would you need any specialist kit to practice on or would a machine to act as a server, a switch and a couple of clients suffice? or a virtual set up?

edit- I see you said £1000 each!

 

[darkmanx]

it looks like an mcse may be the way forward by the sounds of everyones comments, are there any time restraints on when you have to compete the exams by? I mean can I study for one exam then take it then begin to study the second one etc

cheers

 

[darkmanx]

yeah ill have to get some money put aside and get the books bought and start learning, hopefully be decorating the small office/spare box bedroom soon to so will put in a decent sized desk to set some kit up.

I think it might be a good excuse for an upgrade to so I can get a bit better performance out of vmware/virtual pc as im currently running a P4!