CompTIA IT Fundamentals+ (FC0-U61)

The CompTIA IT Fundamentals Certification is an entry level certification designed to introduce users to basic computer principles. It covers basic IT literacy and ensures one understands the different terminology and the various concepts involved In the IT industry. It also serves as a great starting point if you are just getting started in computers and is designed to be the first step on your way to pursuing the CompTIA A+ certification or others similar. Topics covered include hardware basics, troubleshooting, software installation, security and also networking.

[MUSIC] In this overview video we're gonna take a look at the CompTIA IT Fundamentals certification course here on ITProTV. CompTIA fundamentals or what is also called ITF plus is a certification designed for people that are looking to get into an IT career, but don't necessarily have any experience. Put yourself in the shoes of somebody who's changing careers, or just graduated high school and is looking for that job and decides, well, maybe I wanna get into IT. While IT is a very big field and IT fundamentals is designed to expose you to several of the different job role type that are found out they are in the IT industry and hopefully help you decide on which one you want to pursue. Let me show you what i mean, I'm gonna pull up the CompTia web page for IT fundamentals, and if you go in and take a look at the description they tell you right here that it's designed for people considering an IT careers. We kinda see that, noted here, but as you scroll down a bit you'll see some other different topics that are covered in this certification. So let's run through some of this, first opt, IT comes up in terminology, these are words, information or names that you need to be aware of in order to function in the IT world. Every career has a different language that pertains to it and IT is certainly no exception, so this gives us great exposure to that. Beyond that part though, things start to get a little more specific. There's a software development section that's designed for people that are looking to become programmers or developers. You learn about programming constructs and concepts that are necessary to write your own software. There's infrastructure, these are people who are doing things like hardware repair, supporting desktops, laptops, replacing damaged parts, building out computers, even operating in a server environment, you deal with hardware on a regular basis there. We've got database fundamentals, databases are becoming a critical part of every organization's IT infrastructure, so we need to have a basic understanding of how databases function, and the types of things that a database administrator would do from day to day. We also have general applications and software, that's tailored more towards people that are doing desktop support, who's responsible for installing software, troubleshooting software when it doesn't work, keeping it up to date. And then probably one of the most important sections is the security section. This is where we cover topics related to cyber security. It's a rare week that goes by that we don't hear about a company having a breach or some other security-related incident. And security is spread throughout every single IT career. All of these other titles and career types that I mentioned, they all have to deal with security in one way or another. So we need to have an understanding of what that looks like as well. Now none of these are going to bring you up to expert level. They're designed to expose you to what the basic responsibilities of each of those job types are. And help you decide which one of those are interesting to you, or if any of them are interesting to you. IT is not right for everybody, but if you've got a passion for it, if you're really interested, this will help you kind of gauge which courses you'll follow up with as you move on through your IT career. Now let's talk a little bit about the exam, after you've studied and prepared, you are going to wanna take the exam to actually get the certification. And the IT fundamentals exam is nice because it's just a single exam. Now quick word of caution, the FC0-U51 exam, that was released in 2014, it retires in July of 2019. So depending on when you're watching this, it may already be expired. The course you're about to watch is built for the FC0-U61 objectives, the new objectives that are released right at the end of 2018, and these will be relevant for several years. So, that make sure that you're kind of targeted to that newest information, and the exam did change significantly. So if you've been studying the U51 objectives, you'll wanna review the course for U61 before you go and take that new exam. But if you still or kind of under the wire on time, you can jump in and take that U51 exam before it expires. Now to take the exam, well, it's a 75 question computer based exam. So you'll actually go to a computer center. The tests are administered through Pearson Vue, you can go to their website at vue.com, vue.com, and register for the exam. Vue has testing centers all over the world, so you're likely be able to find one within a reasonable drive of where you are located. The exam itself, it's 75 questions and 60 minutes long, now, that's one hour, that doesn't give you a whole heck of a lot of time. It's less than a minute per question, so you really need to know your technologies and move through. But again, it is all fundamental knowledge, basics, and so if you've already got a computer background you'll find that that's plenty of time. If you're new to this though, you'll wanna make sure you stay focused and study all of your exam objectives that you're prepared to answer the questions and move on to the next and still have time remaining. Now, is scored out of 900 points, and a 650 is considered a passing score. So the bar is set not too aggressively to make this a nightmare exam, but not too low where it's a pushover either. So it's a nice, good middle of the road. The exam is offered in a number of different languages so be careful when you register for it. If you want, it's nice to be able to pick in your native tongue to make your exam a little bit easier for you to understand the questions. We certainly wanna be thinking about the technology not so much about the words when we take an exam. English is offered here in the United States and it's kind of default language of the exam. But be sure to check with your Pearson Vue when you register to be able to choose other exam objectives. All right, as far as the price for the exam, that does vary by country. If you wanna find out what the current price is, you can find it on the VUE website, for the Pearson VUE, or you can go to CompTIA's website. The default pricing is in United States dollars, it's $119, but you can also pull up pricing for other regions right there from their website. Also be sure to check the page, don't necessarily trust this video for that pricing is it can change after we film, always be aware of that. All right, well, that's a pretty good description right there of the CompTia IT fundamental certification or ITF plus, if that sounds interesting to you and something that you wanna learn about, then be sure to stay tuned because those episodes are coming up. Now, if you listen to all of that and say, well, I've already got the basics, I'm ready to move on. Well, that's where you can start looking at some of the other examples, some of the things like A+, network+, security+. This is where we start to delve specifically into the more advanced topics. If you wanna learn about networking, you go to network+. You wanna learn about hardware and software, you go to A+. Each one tailored to that particular job role, so be sure to check those out. But if ITF+ is your goal, stay tuned, those episodes are starting now. [MUSIC]