CCNA/P fast track

D

Dephcon

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Jul 27, 2004
Messages
1,234
Hey everyone!

So today my boss told me that he'd hire me full time in January if i get my CCNP.

I'm currently doing a co-op term till the end of the month, then I go back to school for my final semester (ccnp 1 and 4 i think, the program is a Cisco alliance academy or whatever) then I'm back for a second co-op in the fall term term.

So I have from now till the end of December to get my CCNA and CCNP. :eek:

I've already finished the CCNA curriculum (old curriculum) and looking to take the 802 exam sometime in May. My question is how hard is this exam if you've already gone through the training? I do plan on obviously studying for it, to refresh my memory but I dunno how much time I should spend on it since I need to get it done asap so I can move on to the CCNP exams.

I realize that i have 8 months, but I'm going to be doing CCNP and other courses that I'll need to study for up till September.

Ideally I'd like to get my CCNA and complete the BSCI part of the CCNP by the end of May/June before i really need to worry about my school courses and exams. Is this even possible? I hear the BCI is really hard.

Maybe I'm over thinking this situation but the idea that these certs dictate whether I graduate with an awesome job or not is stressing me out.

So if anyone has any tip or thoughts about chewing through Cisco exams in a short amount of time please share. I feel like my chest is caving in. THE PRESSURE!!! :p
 
Considering that there is a great blog post about passing CCIE in 3 months, yes it is possible - but you will need to be very dedicated and focused.

First decide if you can actually eliminate all of your distractions. This means studying every night, no going out, no drinking. If so, then you can do it as long as your will is strong.

Next, setup a DynaMips lab if you haven't already. Do this first, before you start studying or else you will waste tons of time later.

The thing that got me through the material was to stay after work every night for 2 hours to read / study. I did this for 3 months, then I took two weeks completely off, isolated myself from everyone and everything and took a boot camp to review and pass all of the exams (well, all but one; but I passed that one a week later).
 
I'll agree with achivalbackup. If you're focused, you can do it. It will be even easier if you have previous experience with Cisco equipment. However, if you're completely green, it will be very tough!

I have 3 months to finish my CCVP, which is not a problem IMO.

Good luck!
 
First off, make damn sure you have the latest study materials for the CCNA. Cisco retired the 640-801 test last year, and most of the study guides still on shelves at bookstores cover that exam, and not the 640-802.

Cisco has really raised the bar on the CCNA, and they require you to understand a lot more about EIGRP and OSPF than they ever did before. I first obtained my CCNA back in March of 2001, and allowed it to expire in 2004. Last year, my boss made it a career goal to obtain it again, and I bombed the test twice because I didn't have the proper study materials! The required knowledge had changed quite radically between 2001 and 2007, so it was very much an uphill battle for me.

It didn't stop with my CCNA, either. After I finished that up in the middle of last year, I decided to immediately start soldiering on towards the CCNP. WOW, what a task that was.

So you want to get your CCNP?

First off, the Cisco Press books don't tell the whole story. There is editorial information Cisco tests on, that is only available in their official courseware, and in places on their website. It is very difficult to prepare for these four exams if you rely solely on the Cisco Press books.

The first two exams (logically, anyway), namely BSCI and BCMSN are probably the two you are most likely to pass while sheerly relying on their Cisco Press books. I only used the BSCI book and some lab work to study for BSCI, and it was very much a "skin of your teeth" affair. I passed with an 833, but the whole time, I had felt as though I failed it. Definitely the most technically challenging of the bunch.

BCMSN is a relative cakewalk if you like switching technologies.

Then come the two exams which CAN NOT be passed through help from the Cisco Press. That is, the ISCW and ONT tests.

ISCW is a fucking nightmare. It is entirely about WAN routing in a secure fashion. GRE tunnels, PKI, encryption, wireless, IPS/IDS devices, you name it. Worst of all, Cisco requires you to have a deep understanding of this GUI they have developed to help aid the deployment of their WAN routing products. Honestly, I think your best bet with this test is to purchase a Testking, and memorize the answers, because it's not a theory test. It's a test taker's test.

ONT wasn't that much fun, either. It's heavily reliant on your understanding of Cisco Call Manager Express, and QoS. There is also a really annoyingly large number of tricky wireless questions pertaining to Cisco's now deprecated autonomous wireless model.
 
Wow thanks for the great responses guys.

It seems like my only problem is gonna be the hardcore cram style studying. That's definitely my weak area (big time a.d.d.)

It's been slow at work lately so today I started reading Todd Lammle's CCNA study guide. It's going pretty smooth so far since its all review. I've also got all the official Cisco prep stuff from my company's TKL.

I am still worried about the difficulty of the CCNP's though. I took CCNP 2 and 3 (i think) last semester, advanced routing and multilayer switching. I did pretty well, better in routing, so it should mostly be review. However I'm going to have to study the remaining ccnp material before i even finish the courses this coming semester so i can start taking the ccnp exams as early as possible to get it out of the way.

Also at my job I'm dealing with more ccie related stuff like mpls and vrfs so i don't really have any hands on with ccnp stuff outside of school.
 
BakedA|aska said:
First off, make damn sure you have the latest study materials for the CCNA. Cisco retired the 640-801 test last year, and most of the study guides still on shelves at bookstores cover that exam, and not the 640-802.

Cisco has really raised the bar on the CCNA, and they require you to understand a lot more about EIGRP and OSPF than they ever did before. I first obtained my CCNA back in March of 2001, and allowed it to expire in 2004. Last year, my boss made it a career goal to obtain it again, and I bombed the test twice because I didn't have the proper study materials! The required knowledge had changed quite radically between 2001 and 2007, so it was very much an uphill battle for me.
Click to expand...

While you do bring up a few good point about Cisco raising the bar in this particular series I can't agree that they did that much. I took both exams(was forced to actually) and they were pretty much at the same difficulty rating. They added a few harder simlet questions but then again they also removed everything relating to frame-relay on the 802.

BakedA|aska said:
So you want to get your CCNP?

First off, the Cisco Press books don't tell the whole story. There is editorial information Cisco tests on, that is only available in their official courseware, and in places on their website. It is very difficult to prepare for these four exams if you rely solely on the Cisco Press books.
Click to expand...

Im going to agree with you here, the press books do not tell the entire story.... but no one source alone is going to give you the information to really understand the concepts and become a "true" CCNP.

BakedA|aska said:
ISCW is a fucking nightmare. It is entirely about WAN routing in a secure fashion. GRE tunnels, PKI, encryption, wireless, IPS/IDS devices, you name it. Worst of all, Cisco requires you to have a deep understanding of this GUI they have developed to help aid the deployment of their WAN routing products. Honestly, I think your best bet with this test is to purchase a Testking, and memorize the answers, because it's not a theory test. It's a test taker's test.

ONT wasn't that much fun, either. It's heavily reliant on your understanding of Cisco Call Manager Express, and QoS. There is also a really annoyingly large number of tricky wireless questions pertaining to Cisco's now deprecated autonomous wireless model.
Click to expand...

You're talking up these exams way too much, the BSCI was much harder than both of these tests... hands down. ISCW doesn't cover many WAN technologies.... covers extremely basic MPLS(which technically isn't even a WAN Technology, but more an independent forwarding technology ) and broadband/dsl technology, so I don't give the OP a false sense of the material.

[flame]
Also, NEVER EVER recommend to anyone to purchase a testking.... its people like YOU who memorize the material and become nothing more than a damn paper cert and totally discredit the certification:mad: Makes me fu*king sick. And im sure that Ill get a reply with something similar to "You don't know me, you don't know how I studied... blah blah blah......" People that say to memorize the dumps(like you) are nothing more than cheaters. Way to go!
[/flame]

to the OP:

Here's the deal, I work for Cisco.... I needed to pass all the CCNP exams and CCIE written test within my training period(3 months), which I did... so its absolutly possible for you to get the FULL NP in 8 months. Before I came to Cisco I was working on my certs after work... took me a month of reading and LAB to attain each of the two CCNP tests(BSCI & BCMSN). You MUST do an immense amount of lab(or work with the technology daily) to fully understand the concepts of the CCNP.

Like I said earlier, the BSCI is the hardest test for the CCNP. Get that out of the way early on, or if you want, do the composite test as it generally favors more questions relating the the BSCI portion of the track. Good luck man :p

BTW, Ill be sitting for my IE lab in around 2 months :D
 
I was happy to find this thread. I'm planning on going for my CCNA at some point this year or early next year. I am finishing up studying for Network+ and I was told that this is a good logical progression. This coming from a teach who has pretty much every CompTIA certification and several Cisco ones.

At any rate, I'm looking for information regarding how much the exam itself costs. Can someone steer me in the right direction? The Cisco website seems to be lacking that info.
 
xphil3 said:
...snip.....
[flame]
Also, NEVER EVER recommend to anyone to purchase a testking.... its people like YOU who memorize the material and become nothing more than a damn paper cert and totally discredit the certification:mad: Makes me fu*king sick. And im sure that Ill get a reply with something similar to "You don't know me, you don't know how I studied... blah blah blah......" People that say to memorize the dumps(like you) are nothing more than cheaters. Way to go!
[/flame]...snip...
Click to expand...

Thats actually quite funny. My Cisco CAM told me the exact opposite.

Although I do agree. It is people that use brain dumps that discredit the cert. Trust me, I used to work with one and work with one now. It makes it harder on those of us that do know what we're doing.
 
xphil3 said:
[flame]
Also, NEVER EVER recommend to anyone to purchase a testking.... its people like YOU who memorize the material and become nothing more than a damn paper cert and totally discredit the certification:mad: Makes me fu*king sick. And im sure that Ill get a reply with something similar to "You don't know me, you don't know how I studied... blah blah blah......" People that say to memorize the dumps(like you) are nothing more than cheaters. Way to go!
[/flame]
Click to expand...

i tend to agree
 
xphil3 said:
While you do bring up a few good point about Cisco raising the bar in this particular series I can't agree that they did that much. I took both exams(was forced to actually) and they were pretty much at the same difficulty rating. They added a few harder simlet questions but then again they also removed everything relating to frame-relay on the 802.
Click to expand...

I was mostly referring to how the exam had changed between when I first took it in 2001, and when I took it last year. The differences between the 801 and 802 test are pretty slight.

xphil3 said:
Im going to agree with you here, the press books do not tell the entire story.... but no one source alone is going to give you the information to really understand the concepts and become a "true" CCNP.
Click to expand...

Let's be honest here. The only Press books worth a shit for the CCNP track are BSCI and BCMSN.


xphil3 said:
You're talking up these exams way too much, the BSCI was much harder than both of these tests... hands down. ISCW doesn't cover many WAN technologies.... covers extremely basic MPLS(which technically isn't even a WAN Technology, but more an independent forwarding technology ) and broadband/dsl technology, so I don't give the OP a false sense of the material.
Click to expand...

I disagree with your analysis that BSCI was harder, but that's mostly because of how I like my tests to be composed. BSCI and BCMSN are very much theory-based tests where you can rely on your fundamental knowledge of network protocols and technologies to choose the correct answer. Because I have been working with routing protocols and switching technologies for the better part of a decade now, I much preferred those tests as they drew upon my knowledge of theory, rather than Cisco's opinion on architecture.

xphil3 said:
[flame]
Also, NEVER EVER recommend to anyone to purchase a testking.... its people like YOU who memorize the material and become nothing more than a damn paper cert and totally discredit the certification:mad: Makes me fu*king sick. And im sure that Ill get a reply with something similar to "You don't know me, you don't know how I studied... blah blah blah......" People that say to memorize the dumps(like you) are nothing more than cheaters. Way to go!
[/flame]
Click to expand...

Uhhh... A little background is in order, I guess. I'm a senior network engineer for a Fortune 500 online retailer, with 10 years of neteng experience. I don't need TestKing to get certs. I've never used a TestKing to pass any of my own tests, however I have purchased plenty of them for my underlings. When you have a vendor who requires you to staff CCNAs or people with Server+ certs, you don't tend to care if you're manufacturing a "paper tech" in the process. Especially when it's a director in the company who wants your techs to be certified.

It's my opinion that the ISCW and ONT exams are heavily slanted, and the correct answers to those editorialesque questions don't come from either exam guide -- they come from the courseware and website. The lack of router sims on these two exams only further illustrates that fact. My point was merely that the Cisco Press books were complete tripe for those two exams, and that all of the practical knowledge in the world won't teach you how Cisco would like you to answer the questions on these tests.

Flame me all you want, but until Cisco changes those two completely ridiculous tests into something practical and applicable, I will endlessly advocate the use of TestKing for study purposes on those two exams.

Also, it's not like TestKing just gives you the answers. They also explain why the answer is right. I know for a fact that the techs I have mentored have expanded their base of knowledge based on the content of a TestKing. Absolutely, positively.

xphil3 said:
to the OP:

Here's the deal, I work for Cisco.... I needed to pass all the CCNP exams and CCIE written test within my training period(3 months), which I did... so its absolutly possible for you to get the FULL NP in 8 months. Before I came to Cisco I was working on my certs after work... took me a month of reading and LAB to attain each of the two CCNP tests(BSCI & BCMSN). You MUST do an immense amount of lab(or work with the technology daily) to fully understand the concepts of the CCNP.

Like I said earlier, the BSCI is the hardest test for the CCNP. Get that out of the way early on, or if you want, do the composite test as it generally favors more questions relating the the BSCI portion of the track. Good luck man :p

BTW, Ill be sitting for my IE lab in around 2 months :D
Click to expand...

Good luck on your practical exam. I intend to head down that route next year.
 
BakedA|aska - I agree with you on so many points...

CCNA here and now work as an engineer. so not as much hands on experience as i had a year ago when I took the CCNA. Then I was a field installer. All of my networking know how came from the field trial and error and research method. I did not need the CCNA really or anything, and i was doing ok on my own. But it is a Cert. One thing you have to remember about this and any other Cert. ITS PAPER, not real life. The correct answer is the Cicso answer, not necessarily a real life answer that is correct. I messed more than one question on that exam because my real life experience told me otherwise. And my instructor warned me of those.

So yes, use the TestKings and so on. The Cert means you can answer a question the way Cisco wants it answered. There are more network equipment makers than just Cisco out there.

p.s. i laugh at these, ever see a job posting saying "we need a CCNA or CCNE"
guess they dont know the level of difference between the two.
 
I think that this could be a test for you in itself. Your boss is seeing if he can set a goal that will take hard work and dedication in a short amount of time and see if you are the kind of person that is willing to put in the work to accomplish this while learning quite a bit in the process that will be applicable in the future. That is my opinion about the situation.
 
Method said:
I think that this could be a test for you in itself. Your boss is seeing if he can set a goal that will take hard work and dedication in a short amount of time and see if you are the kind of person that is willing to put in the work to accomplish this while learning quite a bit in the process that will be applicable in the future. That is my opinion about the situation.
Click to expand...

You bet it is. Nothing like a test to see how you handle pressure. And, well.. Getting the CCNP in 8 months is doable, but that's certainly what I'd call pressure.
 
Method said:
I think that this could be a test for you in itself. Your boss is seeing if he can set a goal that will take hard work and dedication in a short amount of time and see if you are the kind of person that is willing to put in the work to accomplish this while learning quite a bit in the process that will be applicable in the future. That is my opinion about the situation.
Click to expand...

I never thought of that, great point. Its just kind of odd because the team I've been supporting on my co-op(probably the same team I'll be hired for), some don't even have their ccna because they were scooped up right after there last co-op term. So it's kinda like I'm not good enough as is, which is a bit of a confidence drainer. But ig uess on the other hand, having ccnp would probably raise the starting salary :D
 
Passed my CCNA and CCNP years ago. Let both expire. I have more experience and clout than re-taking those tests again will ever give. (I also had my MCSE+I, A+, HP and a bunch of others in my youth)

The problem is some circles require those certs. If you want an inhouse IT job at a company, they help but are not required. If you want to be a consultant or work for Cisco directly, they are required.

-Robert
 
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