Fortinet - NSE4 - General

My main tips would be to look at the debugging outputs I had 3 or more questions about that. Memorize which engines work on which AV Web Filter etc mechanisms. Also there was a question about routing output as well. So generally I think reading the self paced course and a little bit of experience would be fine. Also you can skip questions and answer them later on the exam. I was afraid to fail in the middle of it because I skipped a lot of questions but it helped because after reading those questions again before finishing the test I’ve figured it out how to answer them. Wish you good luck.

No.2

NGFW Modes.. know them well. Can't say more.

No.3

The text under the slides from nse training portal is what you need to memorise very well. Just the slides alone won't suffice.

No.4

When working through the pdf don’t just read the transcript, look at the slide content also. I found that some of the exam content wasn’t mentioned in the transcripts but was just a note on the slide

No.5

The Security and infrastructure study guide from the Fortinet Training Institutes self paced courses. All the content covered is in there, just takes a bit of time to wrap head around the smaller technical details and vendor specific content

No.6

Think I've spent around 25-30 hours study going over the modules 2-3 times, but it was in a personal way I approached it. I first went through the video modules once, putting down notes as it went. Did the sample questions, find areas where I failed, then went back to the study guide pdf, going over the modules again and cross checking notes. Then went over both study guide pdfs again noting down any cli / diagnostic commands. On day of exam I just went through my summary notes and separate notes filled with cli commands

I did the sample questions 3 times throughout study until I felt comfortable with each section

No.7

Review are your diagnostic commands, and Know how to interpret the results. Also pay attention to details about what can and can’t be done with different inspection modes. Ports and protocols, and destinations for fortiguard updates or lookups.

No.8

Learn all that boring logging stuff. Learn what those codes in the logs mean.

As a person who passed the CCNA exam in under 30 minutes I'd say NSE4 is way harder. CCNA was just "hey, look at this route table and topology and tell me what's wrong" while NSE4 is like "hey, look at this route table and AV profile then tell me what's wrong with the policy". The only way to know the answer is to watch those boring slides very carefully which is my last tip...

No.9

Be familiar with OSI layer 2 and 3 if not already.
Be familiar with IPSec concepts and debugging.
Take all 3 courses and labs.
Take notes during the courses -> a lot of notes