After passing the Microsoft Azure Administrator AZ-104 exam a few weeks ago I have been spending my free time learning the follow on material in order to pass the Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions AZ-305 exam. By passing both exams you can expect to earn the Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert certification.

Study

As mentioned previously I have a subscription to the excellent Cloud Guru website, so my first port of call was the AZ-305 Designing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions course.  This was pretty long (some 35 hours) and had quite a bit of review regarding the AZ-104 topics. However despite this I did think that this helped consolidate that knowledge and made me comfortable that I really did know the underlying services.

There were a number of labs  plus some knowledge check questions.

 

The Exam

I have to say that I absolutely detest having to use Pearson Vue to take certification exams. They are not a company you want to have issues with as they have zero customer service.  Having taken all my exams from home for the last 3 years it was no different here and so I booked the exam for early on a Sunday morning.
I logged in early to my trusty Mac laptop to run the usual system test and was notified that the Pearson Vue App had to be updated. This proceeded and I logged in to do the system check. This is where my issues began.  Sometimes this all checked fine but wouldn’t load the mock exam, other times it would do nothing.  So I thought no problem Ill use a Windows laptop we have with Windows 10.  On this everytime the app launched it killed the network i.e I couldn’t ping anything.  By now the real exam was about to start so I went back to the Mac and did the tests, checked in with my mobile and was placed in the queue.  Great I thought.  However after 15 minutes of waiting a barely inaudible moderator with appalling English came on and said he was starting the exam…  Only it never did.  I contacted him via the online chat and got the usual log out and back again.  So I did.

Back into the queue I went and after another 20 minute wait (now Im into my exam slot) I get another moderator, again with bad English but at least this time kind of audible.  She didnt even bother to start the exam and just told me laptop was not good.  Again the bad English crept in.  I understood she was going to reschedule exam, but after 15 minutes of holding for a case ID she told me it was cancelled and I had to call customer service.

Upon calling customer service they basially tell you they cant do anything and the case will be investigated, but due to COVID they did not know when. Yeah right!
Amazingly though I got refund  to my credit card on the same day. That must be a record as Ive read complaints about this never coming or taking months.

So after being pumped and prepped to take the exam I felt totally exhausted. No matter Ill book at teh test centre. Only in Sweden there are only 3 in the entire country and being summer in the Nordics there were no exam slots for 3 weeks! This is pathetic. With no choice I booked it as early as I could.

Exam day

And so after 3 weeks of waiting and trying to keep my knowledge alive I went to a test centre for the first time in 3.5 years.  I have to say it wasn’t too bad an experience at all. Partly this is because its not Pearson running the test centre 🙂   Check in was smooth.   It was a really warm day and the test room was pretty full with people doing all sorts of IT, project management, sales exams.  The room was air conditioned and the computer fairly new.  It was great to be able to take notes on the erasable plastic, something you cant do at home.

The exam itself was 55 questions including 1 case study with a pass of 700  There were a few items that I had no clue about so had to do my best guess. At the end I reviewed what I could (you cant view some sections) and estimated I was probably short.  Clicking the finish button resulted in the familiar feeling – waiting for the result.  To my surprise it was a pass! Only 726/100 but still a pass is a pass.

So all in all it was a bit of a drawn out process but one Im glad to have done. And now with some Azure knowledge behind me I look forward to getting to put it to work in the real world.