Old CCNA thread was dead, so I'm making a new one for some advice -

Should I pony up for a class like this: http://www.mckimmon.ncsu.edu/ctu/courseoutline2.cfm?SchedID=11381
It's about $1500

Worth it? Yes, no? Would I simply be better off getting the books, studying a lot, and taking the test until I pass?

I know almost nothing about the cert. process, so any input about the whole thing would be appreciated. I'm fairly well experienced in networking basics, so I *think* I could get away without the class part, but I'm wondering how tough it is to study it properly on your own.

1/24/2008 1:19:17 PM

im working towards my ccna and cissp by the end of summer, is that a realistic time frame? anyone know of a good self paced or maybe not so self paced resource worth the money?

1/24/2008 1:37:15 PM

I don't think 1500 dollars isn't worthwhile for any cert class, unless your company is paying for you to take it, or possssibly if your company is requiring you to get it.

My recommendation for getting a foot in the door into networking certs and the industry is to intern/coop at cisco or another local networking company. Surround yourself with equipment, smart netengs, and other coops/interns in a similar boat, and the rest of the pieces will fall into place. I can't overstate how much my cooping experience helped- can't recommend it to others enough.

My recommendation would be to pick up a ccna cert book or two, the jncia and jncis pdfs (available for free from Juniper online, let me know if you can't find them), and to study up before you apply and interview for any of the spots, just to develop a working knowledge to get you through the coop/intern interviews.

Once you're at that point, there are more than a handful of people on here in the industry that I'm sure would be happy to pass your resume along.

1/24/2008 1:47:08 PM

^ agree ... hit me up if your ready for an internship.

Just study through the new material yourself. There is also a new cert that is out or coming out, for entry level network technicians.

If you are learning the stuff from no experience, that may be a good place to start as well, as some feel that ccna is a bit overwhelming now, since there is so much info involved.

1/24/2008 1:59:04 PM

i got a copy of transcenders and one of the ccna bibles (i can't remember the name...this was back in high school, circa 2001)...with those two guides, i passed without any problems (i was doing a+ and net+ at the same time)

maybe ccna has gotten way harder since then (i know stuff has changed), but it wasn't all the difficult in my experience

[Edited on January 24, 2008 at 2:16 PM. Reason : .]

1/24/2008 2:16:03 PM

Also, if you're looking to become familiar with the CLI or want to try throwing together a few full-blown labs, try playing around with a router simulator likes dynamips:

http://www.dynagen.org/tutorial.htm

1/24/2008 2:18:07 PM

Thanks for the great advice guys. I would *love* nothing more than an internship with this kind of stuff all the time, unfortunately(or fortunately, depending on how you look at it), I'm in a full-time co-op for the next 6 months at EMC. I'm working on NAS/SAN storage stuff mostly, but one of our network engineers has agreed to let me spend some time working with him and learning about some of the Cisco infrastructure here.

I've got a friend here who's working on getting his as well, so we'll share resources and study a lot. The Dynamips tool is absolutely awesome, and luckily, I torrented some IOS images a few months back before demonoid went down. We can definitely use the simulator to get the CLI stuff down and try a few things.

This thread's got a good start, so hopefully others can use this as a resource. Thanks for the advice and suggestions - if anyone has anything else to add, please keep it coming.

1/24/2008 6:26:17 PM

not worth it for ccna, for higher certs I might would consider it

1/24/2008 6:32:57 PM

Those juniper cert books are located at:
http://www.juniper.net/training/certification/books.html

They don't cover any switching, but do a great job of covering routing protocols, qos, mpls, l2/l3 vpns, security, cli stuff, etc.

Good reads!

1/24/2008 8:38:47 PM

How did it go?

2/18/2008 5:47:13 AM

pffft

junos.

pfffffffffft

2/18/2008 10:19:48 AM

looking at these juniper books, any particular order they should be read in? hit me on aim when you get a chance

2/18/2008 1:04:26 PM

ordering should be
jncia -> jncis -> jncip -> jncie

junos > ios- I'm sorry
Your only hope is iox- haven't played with it in a while.

2/18/2008 7:48:00 PM

Quote :

"It's about $1500 Worth it? "

what a POS. nothing is worth that unless they take the exam for you and even then it's suspect.

2/18/2008 10:37:36 PM

Just took ccna last wednesday (2/13) and passed with flying colors

You dont need to spend tons of money on classes, books, routers, simulators etc. Don't fall into the trap of believing you need to spend tons of money in order to pass it. I studied from November til the end of January (except during Christmas time) and felt I was well prepared.

What you need is the drive to learn this stuff and you wont have a problem passing. I studied using the Todd Lammle book and had no problems. It is much easier reading than the Cisco press books which have always seemed dry. Study, do some practice tests, get some time in configuring some devices and getting comfortable with the CLI interface and you will be ok.

2/19/2008 5:12:36 PM

http://www.ready4exam.com/Cisco-CCNA-Certification-Training.htm

Quote :

"Cisco CCNA Certification The most convenient way to get CCNA certified - 100% PASS Guarantee You are guaranteed a total reimbursement, PLUS $1000, if we fail to assist you in obtaining CCNA certification in 3 days."

fail the exam and profit

2/20/2008 4:11:17 PM

haha

Amsterdam718 could make a fortune

[Edited on February 20, 2008 at 4:22 PM. Reason : asd]

2/20/2008 4:22:08 PM

^

2/20/2008 4:33:25 PM

2/22/2008 9:27:40 AM

Quote :

"Should I pony up for a class like this: http://www.mckimmon.ncsu.edu/ctu/courseoutline2.cfm?SchedID=11381 It's about $1500 Worth it? "

NO.

Juniper is a joke, dont bother.

And

Quote :

"for higher certs I might would consider it"

QFT. internetexpert.com is a great place for higher level certs.

Quote :

"im working towards my ccna and cissp by the end of summer, is that a realistic time frame? "

Depends on how hard you study. For some people things simply take time to sink in ya know...

Quote :

" My recommendation for getting a foot in the door into networking certs and the industry is to intern/coop at cisco or another local networking company. Surround yourself with equipment, smart netengs, and other coops/interns in a similar boat, and the rest of the pieces will fall into place. I can't overstate how much my cooping experience helped- can't recommend it to others enough. "

Agreed.

Quote :

" maybe ccna has gotten way harder since then (i know stuff has changed), but it wasn't all the difficult in my experience "

Its much harder now. Security, Wireless, IPv6 among other things have been added.

2/25/2008 4:14:30 PM

Quote :

"Juniper is a joke, dont bother."

Care to elaborate? Have you ever used junos anywhere outside of a lab (or olive)? With two posts, my money is on troll/alias, but please prove me wrong. What exactly do you not like about juniper/junos?

2/26/2008 3:20:42 AM

well his link forwarded to DSL.com.. REAL informative.

2/26/2008 8:28:23 AM

Perhaps he meant http://www.internetworkexpert.com/ ?

2/26/2008 8:59:55 AM

^ yes.

no, not an alias or a troll.

[Edited on February 26, 2008 at 9:04 AM. Reason : .]

2/26/2008 9:04:26 AM

I would also advise subscribing to the groupstudy email list for cisco certs @ http://www.groupstudy.com

It is a very productive list of certified professionals who act as tutors, provide recommendations, etc.

2/26/2008 10:34:54 AM

I just finished redesigning an application we refer jokingly as NERK: Network Engineer Replacement Kit.

2/26/2008 5:08:34 PM

juniper stuff is slick from what I've seen thus far but who's prepared to take on cisco in this arena. cisco has too much of a stranglehold on the market for anyone to take away an appreciable portion of the marketshare before cisco just buys them out

2/26/2008 5:38:46 PM

Quote :

"Juniper is a joke, dont bother."

Try to take off the rose colored glasses and not be a fanboy...

Juniper does a lot of things better than Cisco does. A lot of newer enhancements are things that Juniper has been doing for a while. The new NX-OS that powers the new DC3 switches takes several pages out of the JunOS playbook. Cisco virtualization is pretty similar to Juniper vsys and IOS modularity is a copy of the Juniper BSD OS daemon.

Another thing juniper does better is using x86 commoditized CPUs versus a hodgepodge of various CPU architectures that Cisco has.

Then there's the software. IOS, CatOS, PixOS, IOS-XR, NX-OS, SAN-OS. From a customer perspective, it's a little ri-goddamn-diculous.

Yes, Cisco is the 800lb gorilla, and Juniper is the little guy, but the little guy is way more nimble.

2/26/2008 7:18:06 PM

Its ridiculous to have different types of software for different hardware products which each have a distinct and different purpose?

Are you sure about that?

Quote :

"Then there's the software. IOS, CatOS, PixOS, IOS-XR, NX-OS, SAN-OS. From a customer perspective, it's a little ri-goddamn-diculous."

IOS - routers/switches

CatOS - ancient OS which is from the Catalyst company when Cisco bought them. Its not even supported anymore.

PixIOS - firewall, well uh, I would hope the IOS on a security appliance would be a bit different than a router or switch, and promote best practice security philosophies. PIX is going away and its replacement is the ASA5500.

IOS-XR - do you understand what IOS this device runs on? It runs on the CRS-1 which is found at the very core of ISP's. Its a beast and meant to function as one, especially with hot-upgradeable code, etc, developed with minimal downtime in mind.

NX-OS - used in storage switching, built off of SAN-OS, recently deployed in Nexus 7000 that was just released.

SAN-OS - storage networking

But dont forget about the IOS for Wireless LAN controllers, Content Engines, Wide Area Application Engines, etc - they are all different as well.

IOS modularity came from much more than "copying Junipers daemon". Not only is it common sense to do so, but it allows for diversity in the pricing structure which can save customers cash for features of IOS's they dont use, nor plan to. IOS modularization is merely the natural evolution of software development in the business world. That is if youre talking about the feature sets within IOS, and I suppose different types of IOS as you mentioned.

Quote :

"Another thing juniper does better is using x86 commoditized CPUs versus a hodgepodge of various CPU architectures that Cisco has."

Again how many product lines does Cisco have and how long have they been around compared to Juniper? Different devices (access, distribution, and core) use different architectures due to the design and purpose of those devices. Most of Ciscos processors in almost all of their products are RISC processors.

I dont know much about virtualization so I cannot speak on that. Dont really care so much about it to be honest. However Im confident that Juniper did not develop their virtualization all on their own and took pages out of someone elses playbook so that really isnt a substantial point by any means.

No matter how silly you think it might be, the days of the one stop shop engineer are over. There isnt going to be one person who can do it all, nor would it be reasonable to want one type IOS to be the same. "It wouldnt scale" would actually be a valid reason. IOS's are designed for the purpose of the devices function and services its meant to perform.



[Edited on February 26, 2008 at 8:23 PM. Reason : many edits]

2/26/2008 8:00:48 PM

^well put, Bobby.

I love cisco as much as the next guy. I think Juniper has catalyzed a ton of wonderful changes in Cisco. Competition (no matter how small the scale) is always a good thing

2/26/2008 8:01:17 PM

Quote :

"Its a beast and meant to function as one, especially with hot-upgradeable code, etc, developed with minimal downtime in mind."

Why should only the CRS have these features?

Quote :

"Again how many product lines does Cisco have and how long have they been around compared to Juniper"

That's an excuse, not a justification. How does any of what you just wrote support your claim that juniper is a joke?

I rather enjoy fully-tiered configuration, commit and rollback, config diffs (via compare), logical traceoptions in lieu of debug, etc.

To each his own, I guess.

2/26/2008 8:53:10 PM

Nobody mentions Stability??? Its no secret that Juniper is used to build a lot of core ISP networks today. Not that Cisco hasn't come a long way(such as the CRS-1) in that department but news stories like this: http://www.networkworld.com/news/2007/051607-cisco-routers-major-outage-japan.html will still put doubts in people's minds.

Quote :

"“We don't believe the decisions would change based on this event,” Kidron concluded. “Juniper still remains a leading contender at NTT West and Cisco at NTT East.”"

2/26/2008 9:31:40 PM

Quote :

"Its ridiculous to have different types of software for different hardware products which each have a distinct and different purpose? Are you sure about that?"

For different OS's brought in through acquisitions, such as CatOS via the Crescendo acquisition, it's not a huge deal. Over the years it has evolved and integrated well with IOS. For products developed in house, there needs to be more consistency among new product lines. IOS has had a good run, but at this point, its bloated, buggy, and has inherent architectural flaws that can only be fixed by replacing it altogether. However, while we're heading down that path, it seems that we're going in multiple directions at once, with different BUs making different OSs. At some point we have to consider the customer pain in learning, managing, and maintaining multiple OSs.

Quote :

"CatOS - ancient OS which is from the Catalyst company when Cisco bought them. Its not even supported anymore."

I beg to differ, kiddo. CatOS nowhere near the end of support. I know this because I support it. Looks like 7.6(24) was jut posted to CCO just a couple of hours ago. Do your homework before you spout off bullshit.


The rest of your weak arguments were already refuted by cdubya

So, let me guess, you're a new intern and already drinking too much kool aid?

2/26/2008 10:35:19 PM

Quote :

"I beg to differ, kiddo. CatOS nowhere near the end of support. I know this because I support it. Looks like 7.6(24) was jut posted to CCO just a couple of hours ago. Do your homework before you spout off bullshit."

Removed from certification exams. EOS is supposed to follow shortly. Ill look at the roadmap when I get to the office tomorrow.

No Ive been with the company for 3 years.

Quote :

"IOS has had a good run, but at this point, its bloated, buggy, and has inherent architectural flaws that can only be fixed by replacing it altogether. However, while we're heading down that path, it seems that we're going in multiple directions at once, with different BUs making different OSs. At some point we have to consider the customer pain in learning, managing, and maintaining multiple OSs."

The WLAN controller software has massive.... MASSIVE issues.

Quote :

"That's an excuse, not a justification."

No, thats the reality of the situation at hand.





[Edited on February 26, 2008 at 10:48 PM. Reason : .]

2/26/2008 10:43:35 PM

You already claimed that it's no longer supported.

8.6 will reach end of life next year.

8.7 is coming out this spring and is said to be the final CatOS release. However, they said that about 8.1, 8.2, 8.3, 8.4, 8.5, and 8.6... but this time the road map does seem to end at key largo.

It doesn't really matter. The overall point here is that you know just enough to almost sound like you know what you're talking about, but you don't.

Especially saying stupid shit like "Juniper is a joke."

2/26/2008 10:52:57 PM

EOL is 2013 for CatOS

I do know what Im talking about, very well in fact. I made one incorrect assumption, but feel free to stop being a dick at any time. This is why customers and potential internal candidates have a profound understanding that TAC engineers are in short, assholes, which no one wants to work for.

While Juniper may have a good foundation, they are just simply not competitive enough to challenge Cisco in Emerging Markets. Thats where most of our growth is to be gained in the next 5 years especially with our 3rd largest footprint being located smack in the middle east. Ive personally seen numerous tests where our customers were pitted against junipers equipment for certain technology implementation in their networks and we have won a vast majority of the customers business.

Juniper vs Cisco is almost the same scenario as MS vs Apple, but slightly different of course.


[Edited on February 26, 2008 at 11:17 PM. Reason : .]

2/26/2008 11:03:19 PM

Now we're talking about emerging markets? Allusion to MS vs Apple?!? This is hurting my head

I use both junos and ios on a daily basis, my preference is pretty obviously listed in the thread. I think that it is a viable competitor in many markets, most importantly SP routing. Lots of very large networks in the industry share a similar view, making juniper certs and familiarity somewhat lucrative. Find me a JNCIE that's unemployed, and gripes about the fact that juniper is a joke. I guarantee you, you won't find a single one.

My quote saying junos > ios was dumb, more of a jab at some of my former colleagues than anything substantial.

I'm happy to agree to disagree

2/26/2008 11:18:36 PM

Im sincerely not trying to start a flame war on here. I think that Juniper/Cisco superiority has to do with a vast matrix of Enterprise or SP, US market or Emerging market, etc factors. In the big picture it is my position that Juniper cannot compete unless Cisco does something catastrophically stupid.

Its been 1.5 to 2 years since Ive last seen the internal info regarding markets, market share, customer confidence, customer loyalty, etc and its dominated toward Cisco (they were Cisco customers so go figure).

On another note, Tennessee lol.

2/26/2008 11:29:29 PM