CompTIA Cybersecurity Analyst (CSA+): Exam CS0-001 Study Guide Edition

First of all, this is literally the first book released regarding this exam. Second of all, the nature of the exam is a bit different compared to earlier CompTIA exams. This means ONLY reading a book will not be enough to pass this new exam.This book accurately covers the theory and general knowledge base (syllabus) needed to pass this exam. It's to the point and covers many aspects of work done by security analysts in SOCs. It will give you a good base to understand what software suites are used, and what are many procedures used in the industry (from security in the software development cycle, to analysis of incidents). The problem which some people may come up upon, is that the exam's format requires much more interaction between different skills, and this is taught by doing, and not by reading.The two main pieces of software that the CSA+ exam heavily covers is NMAP & Wireshark. Experience in reading logs (system & IDS/IPS) is also required. As questions go, they're mostly situational, namely they'll give you a situation or some output, and you have to identify the best problem/solution, which often is not as clear cut or direct. Simulations in the exam can also be confusing unless you have had a chance to look over & use these two pieces of software (along with some system reporting commands in Windows & Linux). I don't think this book fails to prepare you for these parts, simply because without direct experience, it's can be hard to actually understand the information presented in the exam.While this book has some labs described per each chapter, they might not be enough for everyone. I would also suggest watching some training videos (as of writing this review, only ITPro.TV has a complete CSA+ video course). And regarding use of SIEM software, these suites are often expensive and only found in larger, enterprise networks. So gaining experience on them is hard. Cybrary.it offers a set of online labs for this certification, and while not required, can help someone new to this field gain hands on experience. Supplementing this book with other training is pretty much required in order to pass the exam.As for me, the book worked well, covered the topics well, and along with supplementary training from third parties (videos) & just messing around on my computer, helped me pass this exam.

Update: I passed my test on the first try. I ended up going through this book about four times total as part of my own study method. I would recommend this book. I felt it was pretty detailed and touched on some other topics that may not have been covered by the other CySA+ books. It had a lot more pictures to go along with the reading to show the different reports, logs, etc. that you get from the various software required for the test.Previous: I haven’t taken my test yet, but I’ve read this book through almost twice now. It has a lot of diagrams and pictures to explain the topics. There are occasional typos, but the content seems great despite that minor flaw. I’ve compared this to the other CSA+ books available, and they’re all basically the same on covering all the objectives. One might explain a few concepts more or less than another one does, so they’re great to read together.

This is very good book. It read good and very easy to understand . Actually, this is best available study guide for CYSA +. The book follows the comptia objective which is good because you do not have print the objective and go through it . The book also explains concept in detail and gives good real life IT examples , it could be good reference material for work and to pass the certificate. The author also wrote amazing book for CISSP. I am reading that book also. sometimes I use it for tutoring my class mates and understanding the concept more.

Just passed the CSA+ Exam using this book. The exam was frustrating to say the least. Two of the three simulation questions I got were flat out confusing. I encountered so many questions that this book did not cover. I encountered at least three questions on specific Linux commands for example. The actual exam questions were much harder than the practice ones that are included on this book. I probably would have failed the exam if I didn’t have the experience that I have (10 years IT, 5 of those years were were spent supporting firewalls, pgp, and IDS products) Having said all of that, I think I also would have failed if I didn’t read this book. I didn’t know the formal incident response process for example. The book also covered so many that I didn’t see at all on the exam, which is frustrating also. CVSS and regulation questions for example.All in all, it’s really hard to rate tech study guides like this. I think people tend to rate them base on whether they passed or not. I could tell you now though that my experience with the exam is probably not going to be like your experience. I studied nmap and wireshark a lot because many have said they encountered those a lot, but with my exam, I got probably one question with wireshark and none on nmap, so cest la vie. I think that if a candidate has the recommended security+ cert and years of experience, he or she will pass using just this book.

When preparing for my Security+, i've abandoned the textbook several times because of how dry and uninteresting it was. This book is the opposite. I finished it in under two weeks and i will go through it again to take my notes before doing the exam. All the explanations are clear and the post-chapter quizzes help you brush up on the material. Highly recommended.

The CompTIA CySA+study guide was essential for me to pass the test. The book provided the depth that I needed on the topics that I was weak on and the online tools such as the flash cards helped me out to learn and be ready for the exam. I would highly recommend this book.

Covers a lot of content and they are clear when the CSA+ content differs from actual practice, so you have the information needed for the certification but at the same time you don't lose the perspective of the industry practices..I am using this book alongside Certmaster, there are a couple of differences in minor things but using both tools together seems to me really useful, hoping to pass the exam!