The old CompTIA A+ exam from 2005 still haunts me sometimes

I was prepping for my first IT job at a repair shop in Akron back in 2005 and the A+ exam had all these questions about IRQ settings and jumper pins on hard drives. That test was pure memorization and I still can't look at a floppy drive without twitching. Has anyone else noticed how much easier the certs are now compared to back then?

3 comments

3 Comments

nina_campbell1mo ago

The IRQ stuff was brutal. I had a Dell Optiplex GX260 and I spent a whole weekend just memorizing which IRQ went to the COM ports and the floppy controller. I remember feeling like a genius when I passed that test, but now it's all plug and play.

the_anthony1mo ago

Memorizing IRQs for a weekend sounds like a flex more than a necessity. Was that test really that deep or just old school gatekeeping?

taylorc401mo ago

Nina nailed it with the GX260. I had a Dimension 2400 and I memorized IRQ 4 for COM1, IRQ 3 for COM2, IRQ 6 for the floppy, IRQ 14 for the primary IDE. That was the entire weekend. You'd sit there with a printed out chart and a highlighter. Now they ask "what's the first step in troubleshooting a slow computer" and the answer is always "check the hard drive" or "update drivers". No jumper settings, no dip switches. It's like they removed all the annoying hardware stuff and made it a customer service exam.