70-226

(70-226) Designing Highly Available Web Solns

SYNOPSIS • MCSE 2000 ^vs

Microsoft’s exam 70-226, “Designing Highly Available Web Solutions with Microsoft Windows 2000 Server Technologiesâ€? is a core or elective requirement for the MCSE (Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer) on Microsoft Windows 2000 certification. It is designed for candidates who “work in medium to very large Internet or corporate intranet environments that use Microsoft Windows 2000 operating systems.â€? There is no specific prerequisite for this exam but Microsoft recommends that candidates have “minimum of two years' experience planning and designing highly available Web site infrastructuresâ€? in the type of multiserver, n-tier application environments described here.

This exam is moderate to hard in difficulty and costs $125 USD. It may be taken from Pearson Vue or Thomson Prometric.

At one time this exam had a passing score of around 591, but this is subject to change. “Beginning with the release of the Microsoft Windows Server™ 2003–related exams, Microsoft will provide numerical scores on exams. By the end of September 2003, most exams will have the new score report format, which includes this numerical score... The new scale requires a minimum passing score of 700 on all exams. The maximum score on the exams will vary depending on the complexity of the skills being measured.� - Microsoft Exam and Testing Procedures FAQ

Note that Microsoft does not document the format of a particular exam: “Microsoft exams might include adaptive testing technology and simulation items. Microsoft does not identify the format in which exams are presented.� In the past, though, this exam consisted of around 49 questions, broken up into a few case studies.

The topics covered by this exam include:

• Designing Cluster and Server Architectures for Web Solutions
• Designing a Highly Available Network Infrastructure
• Planning Capacity Requirements
• Designing Security Strategies for Web Solutions
• Designing Application and Service Infrastructures for Web Solutions

For more information:
http://www.microsoft.com/traincert/exams/70-226.asp