Taking my CCNA Next month.

K

Kaiga

Gawd
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I'm scheduling to take my CCNA mid-Janruary and was wanting to ask a few questions of those who already have taken it.
What topics did the CCNA stress for you?
What are the questions like? Are they trick questions or are they pretty straight forward?
How complex and specific did some of the questions get?

I'm hoping to only take this test once, I have been studying and reveiwing my butt off for it for the past 3 and a half months (yes cancer has put me out of work that long so I've been using the time to study this stuff to become like a second nature to me.) I'm hoping to pass it the first time. However, I'm pretty sure they aren't going to make it easy and that the test will only focus on really complicated scary topics. After this I'm going to be studying for my CCNP!

Thanks in advance.
 
I took the CCNA earlier this year to re-certify (the composite test) and like all the Cisco tests there is a wide range of difficulty on the questions. The drag and drops are usually gimmies as are the simulations for the most part (for me at least since I have a lot of hands-on xp). There really aren't any "trick" questions but they do occasionally throw in answers that seem correct until you really think it through carefully. Obviously I can't tell you what's on the test but if you have a solid grasp of the material listed in the exam outline on their website you should have a fairly decent chance of passing the first time.

My first CCNA was several test versions and many, many years ago (ISDN and lots of frame-relay material) but I managed to narrowly pass it. I was the only one in my boot camp that did (no braindumps provided). The last one I took was a "better" test with fewer seemingly ambiguous questions so it's definitely possible if you really comprehend that material and are relaxed and confident when you hit the test center doors.

Good luck
 
Yup I'm taking my ICND1 here on the 28th, watching the CTBNuggets videos and reading the CCNA for dummies book has helped me a lot
 
We're about to start a CCNA class up at my work. So, I'm hoping to take it about March or so. From what I've been told so far, the CCNA can be a pain, but the CCNP is a whole lot easer. So, hopefully I'll have that one done by the end of the year.
 
Oh god, CCNP is way harder than CCNA. The thing that still gets me off my rocker sometimes is the IPv6 stuff, and ISDN (no idea if they still do that). The drag/drop and simulations are the easiest if you've had a lot of exposure to doing hands-on.
 
The CCNP is definitely not easier than CCNA. The CCNA may seem more daunting at first because people's experience level is lower when they attempt it for the first time, but the material on the CCNP is much, much more in-depth. Plus regardless of how much experience you have you're probably going to have a few subjects that you've never seen in the real world that you'll need to bone up on.
 
Kaiga said:
I'm scheduling to take my CCNA mid-Janruary and was wanting to ask a few questions of those who already have taken it.
What topics did the CCNA stress for you?
What are the questions like? Are they trick questions or are they pretty straight forward?
How complex and specific did some of the questions get?

I'm hoping to only take this test once, I have been studying and reveiwing my butt off for it for the past 3 and a half months (yes cancer has put me out of work that long so I've been using the time to study this stuff to become like a second nature to me.) I'm hoping to pass it the first time. However, I'm pretty sure they aren't going to make it easy and that the test will only focus on really complicated scary topics. After this I'm going to be studying for my CCNP!

Thanks in advance.
Click to expand...

The biggest problem with all of Cisco's tests is that you can have a question with 5 answers with 2 you know not being possible, but the others are. You then have to determine of those 3 that are plausible, which one is the "Cisco answer", and worst still is that 2 of the 3 actually are correct answers for the question at hand. It's that Cisco has a very specific way of answering the questions they pose.


As for the CCNA vs CCNP, I can see the NP being easier for some folks. I had a hard time re-certifying on the NA a few years back because it was a lot of information I took for granted, or used tools for so long that doing things by had caught me by surprise. On the other hand, the NP related material I did during my day to day activities involved more critical thinking, so it was always fresh in my mind. For example, troubleshooting methodology is always rattling around up there because (a while back) I was fixing stuff on a daily basis, so I knew the steps. The inverse is NAT & ACLs. I did so much copy & pasting that I rarely had to think about what I was doing, so when it came time to test on those areas I didn't do so well, despite setting them up multiple times a day.
 
Know how to subnet quickly. If you can break out number of hosts on a given subnet quickly you will have a huge advantage.
 
cyr0n_k0r said:
Know how to subnet quickly. If you can break out number of hosts on a given subnet quickly you will have a huge advantage.
Click to expand...

Yeah, this is going to be my 1 big trouble area. I know there's a couple of "tricks" to remembering host's per subnet. I just hate memorizing things. lol

But, they give you a piece of paper when you first get there right? Hopefully I can write it down before I go brain dead, and forget it. ;)
 
rozeny2k said:
Oh dont worry questions will be pretty straight forward concerning the latest dumps and router configurations.I will recommend you to study exam tips,tricks and solved papers from http://ccnaexam4u.blogspot.com
Click to expand...

Good website, I'll be using that for some review, thanks :)

cyr0n_k0r said:
Know how to subnet quickly. If you can break out number of hosts on a given subnet quickly you will have a huge advantage.
Click to expand...

I've got subnetting down pretty good, so I should be fine on that part.
 
JeffBlair said:
Yeah, this is going to be my 1 big trouble area. I know there's a couple of "tricks" to remembering host's per subnet. I just hate memorizing things. lol

But, they give you a piece of paper when you first get there right? Hopefully I can write it down before I go brain dead, and forget it. ;)
Click to expand...
Yes, they give you a dry erase board thing to jot down problems.

What I did was I memorized 4 of the main subnets, then taught myself how to build the entire subnet table from /15 to /29 using the 4 that I already knew. Then when I sat down I used the time they give you to read all the legal agreements (usually 15 minutes) to build the entire table on that dry erase paper. This way when I started the test I had it all right in front of me. It allowed me to complete the entire test in about 40 minutes.
 
cyr0n_k0r said:
Yes, they give you a dry erase board thing to jot down problems.

What I did was I memorized 4 of the main subnets, then taught myself how to build the entire subnet table from /15 to /29 using the 4 that I already knew. Then when I sat down I used the time they give you to read all the legal agreements (usually 15 minutes) to build the entire table on that dry erase paper. This way when I started the test I had it all right in front of me. It allowed me to complete the entire test in about 40 minutes.
Click to expand...

15 minutes? That sounds good.
I can get my binary and subnet tables written down in that time.
I have an excerpt from Sybex that has my 16-30 that I'm going to do a quick memorization of before I go to take the test.
 
I usually right down
Code: 
128|64|32|16|8|4|2|1
then I'm good to go, as long as I have that subnetting is easy peasy.
 
Dark Shade said:
Yup I'm taking my ICND1 here on the 28th, watching the CTBNuggets videos and reading the CCNA for dummies book has helped me a lot
Click to expand...

hey, i was just wondering if studying just those 2 resources helped on the exam? do you recommend studying more then what those have to offer? im planning to go for this cert, and any info about this would help.

thanks
 
CBTnuggets is a good starting point but not detailed enough to ensure you pass the exam(s) by itself. Generally I use the Cisco Press books but only if they are the newer ones. Some of the older ones have a lot of mistakes in them. Once you know the basics the Cisco "quick reference" books are good for each exam as well since they align reasonably well with the test questions.
 
thx for that info mattjw916. i will probably ask my professor if he has any of those press books that i could borrow before i spend some $$. i took a CCNA netacad course (2 semesters) a year ago and it was cramped up to the point where everyone was rushing and didnt learn anything.......lol. now that i have some off time, my goal is to study and get that cert :D
 
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