Please note : this page is out of date and has been superceded by CCNA Tips II

Kerry's tips on getting a CCNA

Monday, October 7, 2002
Updated: Tuesday, March 18, 2004

Over the last few months I've been working on something that I've been meaning to do for years : to get myself a Cisco certification. Now, I've been working in network for about 10 years now but I've never had the chance to test my knowledge. For me, working towards the Cisco baseline certification was a great filler - it filled in many of the holes that I didn't know or simply wasn't sure of.

If you don't know already, a CCNA ( Cisco Certified Network Associate ) it the first and most basic of the Cisco certifications. In fact, Cisco expect you to have a CCNA before you go on to any of their other certifications.

My Approach
First thing I did was to buy a book. There's quite a few good CCNA books around, such as the Sybex CCNA book by Todd Lammle, or the Cisco Press book by Wendel Odum, "CCNA Certification Guide". I did a quick review of both and ended up with the Cisco Press book. They are both much the same, but the Cisco Press book seemed slightly better laid out and the printing and binding were of a better quality.

You will also need access to Cisco equipment. I've had a little exposure to their stuff over the last few years, but didn't have any equipment available to study on. No problem! I found that there is equipment available over the Internet for free - just to to R1R2.com and you'll find a great setup for you to access a couple of routers to practice on. At no cost. These guys are just cool.

So there went all my spare time for about 6 months. Reading the book, doing the test questions, and practicing on the routers at R1R2.com. It didn't seem like study, in fact I found it quite interesting. While I knew many of the concepts and had much of the knowledge, I also learned a lot of new things.

Another great source of advice is Dave's Study Tips for CCNA Exam - Dave Lilligren gives a great over view about what the important topics are ( and what isn't so important ). For example, you need to know subnetting very well. If you aren't comfortable with bitmasks and network addresses then you probably won't pass the exam.

Fortunately, Cisco have removed some old stuff from the CCNA curriculum. You don't need to know stuff like AppleTalk any more, but you do still need to know the basics of IPX - it seems that there's still plenty of Novell networks around. You need to know IP very well, particularly how it fits in the OSI model, and how encapsulation and routing work.

The CCNA certification is interesting to do, and a great baseline certification for anyone working in networking. Its not too Cisco-specific, and gives the student a very thorough understanding of modern networking.

Additional CCNA Training Resources

  • SemSim CCNA Training Software - Provides CCNA training through Cisco router simulator based virtual labs. Includes free labs and practice questions for students.

  • Cisco CCNA site - the homepage for the Cisco CCNA certification.


Kerry Thompson, CCNA CISSP

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