Great question....personally I'm a fan of Cisco and any Certifications they offer. However I'm working towards a A+ and its a lifetime Cert and Cisco may not be. I'm working towards MS's Certs too and they would have lead down the road to Cisco Certs based on the program I was in. A+ seems more Hardware and the others Certs software related too networking plus networking covers so many areas that tread on hardware yet software issues. A+ goes into the software side but its a hardware Cert to be honest.....good luck and study hard.