How to Crash AWS Certified Solutions Architect-Associate Exam in 1 month
Before you take this exam, we recommend you read this guide.
So you’ve finally chosen to invest in yourself! With an influx of people taking AWS Certification exams, you can’t help but imagine and embrace the trend. To succeed, what you need is a quick hack.
This essay is written for folks who have never used AWS before. However, that isn’t the case with me because I’ve been working on AWS products for the past year, so I’ll do my best to make this guide as smooth as possible.
Believe in the process not the outcome
I took the exam not because I like the certificate, or because I need it for your job, it helps find a good job but is not mandatory, why did I do it? so the main reason is falling in love with the process. My biggest why is because I lost hope, in everything after I failed in my search fund adventure, and I didn’t have any desire to work or learn, so the best wake-up call is to do an exam, something that everybody hates, doing an exam.
For any exam you take, a fundamental understanding of the Certification and what it is for is essential to increase your chances of acing it. In AWS’s own words, the AWS Certified Solutions Architect-Associate is to :
This credential helps organizations identify and develop talent with critical skills for implementing cloud initiatives. Earning AWS Certified Solutions Architect — Associate validates the ability to design and implement distributed systems on AWS.
Anyone working with Data(Data analysts, Scientists, etc) should ideally breeze through the exam as it tests you on the fundamentals. For someone new to the cloud space, you will need to spend some additional time to grasp these fundamentals. Either way, preparing for the certification will open up avenues for up-skilling yourself in different dimensions of Data Engineering and a possible career transition (no promises though!)
The tools
Let’s get right into the courses and the best resources you’ll need for the exam now that you’ve learned the essentials of the certification. The resources are listed in ascending significance.
Stephane Maaerk
Stephane Mareek’s Ultimate AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate is a must-have if you’re serious about studying the ins and outs of AWS services, not just getting the certification. Stephane does an amazing job of decomposing services into important components and simple principles, all while keeping the flow of his course exciting and current.
Stephane’s course is a paid Udemy course and you get quality content that is updated on a regular basis. Stephane’s course has been updated to match the AWS SAA-C02 for 2022 as of this writing (March 8th, 2022), ensuring that he is always on top of his content and that you get the most up-to-date AWS SAA study materials from him.
Although Stephane’s courses are listed as expensive, I’ve never seen them at full price. Udemy is virtually always running a sale, usually with a 65–85% discount. Even at full price, I’d say that his course is worthwhile if you really want to study the AWS SAA services inside and out. You also have it for life, which means you’ll be able to access it whenever he changes it.
Tutorial Dojo
If you search the internet for AWS SAA-C02 study guides, you’ll see that practically everyone recommends Tutorial Dojo’s practice exams, and with good reason. When it comes to passing the AWS SAA-C02 exam, Jon Bonso’s course is undoubtedly the most significant piece of the puzzle.
Tutorial Dojo’s course is divided into four sections Timed Mode, Review Mode, Section Based and Topic Based. Jon Bonso’s practice exams are the closest thing you can come to actually taking the test. There are 60 questions, with a 90-minute limit, with 6 practice exams to go through.
The questions are virtually comparable to those on the test, but not exactly. It provides ample practice and offers you a solid idea of the types of questions and scenarios you’ll see on the test. AWS enjoys attempting to confuse you by cramming superfluous material into a question in order to distract or confuse you. Some of the questions are even organised so that based on keywords in the exam question, you can remove all but the most obvious answer.
This type of mental preparation not only prepares you for specific scenarios but also educates your brain to process the questions.
You train your brain to hunt for essential information, which eliminates two of the four options.You’ll know you’re progressing when you get the feel of the exam flow and recognise that most questions are split 50/50 between two of the four options.
Whiz-labs
There are 9 practice tests in this course, as well as individual topic-based tests. The best thing about Whizlabs is that it keeps you striving to go deeper. The practice test covers a wide range of questions that will help you prepare for the exam. After you give an answer, there are links to official AWS documentation. If you want a more detailed explanation of the incorrect response, read the manual.
Whizlabs practise examinations, in my opinion, are quite nice and contain realistic problems, albeit the real exams were a little more difficult overall. The pricing is reasonable, and they frequently run promotional bundles. For your information, I paid 9.95 pounds for the AWS Certified Solutions Architect Associate examinations.
ACloudGuru
Stephane appears to devote a significant amount of time and effort to ensuring that his pupils receive the highest quality curriculum possible. His videos, slides, and general content appear to be very professional and of the highest quality.
Acloud Guru's content, on the other hand, is not the most up-to-date, lacking a few areas that should be addressed in depth, and the quality of the content is also not that outstanding. While taking the course, I was dissatisfied with the information quality. I signed up on their website after reading some positive reviews about their courses, however, it appears that their focus has switched to solely exploiting past ratings while failing to deliver on any of the promises made in high-quality content.
Given that the same management and content team is now in charge of Linux Academy, I would stay away from both companies (only my personal view) for the near future. Please stay away from this shady platform.
The strategy
Let’s imagine you have a month to study for the exam. You’ve never worked with AWS before, but you want to pass the exam. This is an easy-to-follow guide to help you achieve just that.
Now, before I proceed with the strategy, if you have no other choice, do as I say! The AWS Certification is very adaptable, and you can reschedule it for a little charge at any time.
That being said, this strategy is not for the faint of heart! It entails coping with a slew of statistical omissions, some of which could have disastrous effects. But it’s still your best chance to ace it in a month, so keep reading!
The exam consists of 65 questions, with a minimum of 50 questions required to pass. You will have to follow and complete the following :
Stephane Maaerk
In this part I spent ten days, seeing the videos of the course and reviewing the Notes twice.
Whiz-labs
In this part I spent seven days doing all the exams a couple of times, to grasp the concepts.
Tutorial Dojo
In this part I spent thirteen days, doing all the exams three times, repeating each section of the course a couple of times until I have passed all of them.
The exam-taking experience at home
This section is solely about my experience with the exam’s Pearson Vue mode. In a summary, the Test Taking Experience was a lot of work (mentally). The test took me two hours to finish.
You must comprehend how the exam operates. So, a few days before the exam, you must register using the OnVUE app, which captures images of you and recalls you as a test taker.
You must use the same app to verify your identity on the day of the exam, as well as a government-issued proof of your personal information. I was able to use the internal webcam for the duration of the test once I got past this.
But first, let’s talk about the test, the OnVue asks you to scan the entire room and check your surroundings thoroughly. All this takes a good 30 minutes so make sure you log in at least 40 minutes before your scheduled time.
The exam took two hours and a half to finish, and the price was 150 dollars.
