CompTIA Security+ Get Certified Get Ahead: SY0-501 Study Guide Kindle Edition

Great book, just recently passed the SY0-501 Exam. Darril does a good job of covering the important aspects behind Security + and has a good amount of foot stomp sections so you know what is actually important to remember.One thing to watch out for is the practice questions. While the practice questions are good, they are almost too good. Darril's questions are clarified/elaborated well which makes selecting the appropriate answer simple assuming you studied for it. The CompTIA test questions in comparison can be extremely vague and not as well structured. I found the questions in the book put me in a false sense of security due to how well I was doing and when confronted with the actual CompTIA questions I was baffled at times. This isn't necessarily a fault , moreso something to be aware of that can easily be mitigated through use of additional test question/practice exam resources..

I used Darrill Gibson's 401 to pass my exam and just purchased the 501 for my husband to use to study. I want to address some things from the other reviews1 - To pass this exam you need to use multiple sources and materials. You should know this but in case you don't, now you do.2 - Out of all the materials I used to study, Gibson's book was by far the best and I've lent my book out to others who have said the same. I've even been told that the people I lent my books to wouldn't have passed if it wasn't for adding this book to their study list.3 - I was not in IT before this exam. I was working on my degree but had no experience. My friend who I lent this book to for her exam prep WAS an IT guru and she couldn't get over how much it helped her. This book is great for beginners AND IT experts alike.If you plan to take this test, you need this book. GOOD LUCK

I have an application development background … not a network engineering/admin background.I read the book twice. On the 2nd pass I took the end of chapter quizzes. I also bought the end of chapter reviews/”remember this” audios. On the weekend before the exam I reviewed my highlights and notes for each chapter while I listened to the audios. This really helped cement things and get me ramped up for the brain dump of the test.I had particular trouble piecing together chapter 3 networking concepts. That chapter kind of just cruises through that topic and you have to read it slowly and thoroughly along with chapter 4 on securing the network if you don’t have a networking background.About the book: The book is good. Sometimes I had to mentally edit and summarize the author’s explanations for myself. He tends to launch into examples and there is sometimes a lot of wordiness and you get lost as to the tie in to the subject at hand … in my opinion. But, all good content if you read it like a novel the first time you go through it and just highlight the first time. The second time you should verify that your highlights make a summarized story for you to just read during your final (third) jam session.I just took the test a couple of days ago and passed on the first try! GOD deserves all the credit and all the glory.This test is hard now. There is no way to skim through the material and pass it. There is way too much content for you to remember. You have to just drill on it until it becomes somewhat natural information to you.About the test:1. There are performance based questions now. I had about 4-5 of those as the first questions on the exam. One showed you an office layout and had you drag/drop physical access controls to each laptop server in the different rooms (like cable locks, CCTV, biometric scanners, cipher locks, etc.). Another performance question showed you a log and asked you to identify the entry where the attack started. I didn’t even know what the log was but it looked like a log of hashes and so I identified where the hashes duplicated (some kind of replay/spoof attack) and got it correct. Find a different book for performance based questions. This one lacks the ferocity needed to answer those heavily weighted questions.2. I had no questions on ports such that they asked me which service or protocol was running on which port. I came in prepared to answer just the most popular ports such as 20, 21,22,23,25, 88, 983, 443, 80. However, there were only 2 questions that included ports, services, protocols in the answers and you had to choose the correct bundle. I had heard they are moving away from port questions on the exam.3. Other areas: VLANS, containerization, SCADA, attack types, wireless APs, mobile devices, vulnerability scanning, frameworks, etc. There were a lot of “Given the following scenario, which …”.Good Luck!

Darrill Gibson's books, website, and study materials are fantastic. I bought this Kindle edition as soon as it came out so I can look ahead to the new material. One option to retaining my Security+ certification is to retest in three years. With this book and all study materials, I'm confident that I will pass again. A note to other buyers -- If you buy this book and the study package available on his website, do yourself a favor and do everything he tells you. Take all the advice. If you don't play around, but follow this guide and put in the time, you will pass. Thanks, Darril, for everything!

I've been an Amazon customer since long time ago and this is my first review, as I think this book deserved it. I bought the kindle version of this book. The book contains not only the knowledge necessary to pass the certification but also practical (and sometimes even funny) examples that helps you have a more solid understanding of the topics described. Additionally the author keeps a web page that contains labs you can perform to have a hands-on experience of some of the book's topics.However although all of that was great, the best part of the book in my opinion was the short "need to remember" sections. On my kindle I highlighted all of these short paragraphs and after reading the book 1 time I dedicated myself to read a few times these need to remember sections, which I think was the key to pass this certification. Kudos to the author for such a good book.

This was my first time attempting to pass an exam from reading material rather than videos or classroom led courses and for this reason I was dubious at first, however after really spending a lot of time going through every page of this book and using the practice exams that are placed throughout the book along with a few online practice tests too I managed to pass Security+ first time! Given the whole purpose of this book is to pass and this was my sole source of study (for the most part), I can't really give it anything other than 5 stars.To add to the quality, the book was really well written too, had simple ways of explaining things but was also technical enough to give you a real good understanding of how it all worked along with some real world comparisons.If you're looking for a study book to pass this exam then look no further.

Bought this book some time ago and finally sat down to read it! Passed the Security+ first time after reading through the book twice and going through the questions in the book. For those wondering I passed within 8 weeks of properly studying whilst also working. I'd recommend setting the exam date 12 weeks out from starting the reading.Darril Gibson has an excellent way of getting to the point very quickly. Key concepts are also repeated throughout the chapters to reinforce the exam "must knows"! Also the labs are very useful to get a bit of hands on.

I ordered this book for my studies in CompTIA Security+ and all I can say it's pretty damn good.I have enjoyed every chapter Darril R. Gibson has created. He has a knack for explaining things and if you are a fan of Simpson's then I strongly recommend it. Each chapter has a small quiz at the end which helps you understand your readiness for the exam.There are two large exams one at the start of the book and one at the end, these will help you understand how much you know and how much you've learnt.I strongly recommend the book and will buy other material from Darril R. Gibson again.

I decided to purchase this book after struggling to follow/grasp the Security + material concept via a training course on a video site as this book has been recommended by several people who have passed the Security + exam.After purchasing the ebook I immediately created a study plan and started to read the first chapter. It was evident from the start that Darril Gibson is very knowledgeable and knows how to explain complex concepts in a manner that is easy to comprehend (although I'd recommend videos as well to solidify your knowledge) and at a pace that is not overwhelming.There is also a 10% voucher for the exam which is always a nice gesture.After the intro but just before the contents there is a thorough mock exam to test your knowledge, this is a brilliant way to gauge your initial starting knowledge and to identify strong/weak areas.The contents is structured in several paragraphs covering the main exam sections, each chapter has an exam at the end covering what was covered to test your knowledge and ensure you've retained what you've read. I suggest only doing these exams once or twice maximum and to not only get the correct answer, but to know why it's the correct answer and the rest are wrong.Once you've covered all the chapters there is another large mock exam covering the material from all the chapters, I'd recommend doing the first exam and this one to see what areas you need to polish up on.Unfortunately there is one key area that I felt the book didn't cover enough/at all and it was firewall logs and how to read/understand them - there were alot of these questions within the exam and I felt caught off guard. However, I believe this may be covered in some of the online material that Darril provides links to within the book so this may be more due to me not doing the labs.I must also pre-warn you, the CompTIA Security+ exam has a way of making you doubt your own answers, I genuinely felt I'd done terrible all the way to the end and half the time it was more trying to understand what they were asking from me rather than trying to give the correct answer. The way the questions are written is entirely different to how they are written in Darril Gibson's book - but still, I was able to eliminate wrong answers to at least give myself a 50/50 chance to get the right answer.This was easily one of the best purchases I've made and I am still going over the book and the labs now to better refine my knowledge.Highly recommend this book, but I'd suggest another study source to provide a second way to understand the concepts covered.Good luck!

Absolutely brilliant book, used this as my sole study guide (with the additional audio from the maker) and managed to pass first time 6 weeks later. Cannot recommend this enough for the SY0-501 Security+ exam.