Okay so I just got my passing score this morning (713, barely scraped through but I'll take it) and I feel like I owe this community a post because honestly the advice here is what got me over the line. I failed this thing twice — once in March at 612 and again in April at 658 — and I was starting to think Active Directory just wasn't clicking for me no matter how many hours I put in.
What finally made the difference was switching how I studied. I'd been reading the Microsoft Press book cover to cover like it was a novel, but the problem is 70-640 is heavy on scenario-based questions. I started focusing almost exclusively on a solid MCTS 70-640 practice test set to identify exactly which topics I was weak on — trusts, site replication, RODC configuration, Group Policy filtering. Once I knew my gaps, the study guide material actually made sense instead of just washing over me.
If you're deep in prep right now, my biggest piece of advice: don't underestimate the DNS integration questions. I probably had 8-10 of them and I wasn't expecting that density. Happy to share more exam tips if anyone's still grinding through this one.