Passed the CCSA 156-215.80 for R80

On a whim, I went and took the new R80.10  CCSA exam today. A few months ago I had to sit through about three days of labs and content for the course. The course material is pretty good (although having to use Capsule Docs can get kind of rough), but be prepared to put in at least eight hours a day for the training with the possibility that it might take you an extra day to complete everything. I have taken this test for just about every major version since 2000, so a lot of the concepts are still the same.

I thought it was a fair test, and did a good job of representing the content of the CCSA course. One thing that was interesting is seeing questions on licensing in the exam: I had about five or six questions like this. It was a pretty good mix of questions. The CCSE exam is usually pretty difficult (ask your SE if he/she has passed it) so that one will require some studying.

Then a few hours later I received this marketing email from Check Point:

Dear Patrick,

Check Point Education Services will be hosting a special certification exam offer at CPX 360 in Las Vegas.

The benefit of passing the exam at CPX 360 is your certification benefit will be valid for 3 years instead of 2 years!

So if I had waited a few weeks to take the exam at CPX 360 it would be good for an extra year? Uh…okay?