having CCNA exam in few days & being so nervous.. help m

Samin

hi everyone
please help me. i'm going to have CCNA exam on Tuesday. i'm so afraid... how can i be sure that i will pass it?
please give me some helpful advices. what should i study more?? i have some problems in WAN technologies...
is it really a hard exam??
does it include labs?

shimabuku

I think everyone gets nervous at exams, it's just the thought of failing and having $100-$150 go down the drain. I just passed the 640-811 today, I am assuming you are going the one exam route. What I did even before I sat in my chair at the testing center, I asked for a pen and paper that they will be giving me for the exam and wrote /9 - /30, the AD for rip, igrp, eigrp, and ospf, load balancing before taking the exam. You said that you were having problems with Wan Tech. I would then brush up on that area eg. frame relay and isdn. I had about 4 questions on my exam pertaining to NAT. Like I said, I have not taken the single exam route so I can't say how your exam is going to be like. Good luck though.

fondue

Try to relax, yes it's easier said then done. If you have gear or access to a lab get some hands-on time. The hands-on time always calms me down. I find that reading and reading and reading and reading just fills my head like a memory buffer that needs to be dumped. I free it up with hands-on experimentation and tinkering.

Like shimabuku, I took the first 5 minutes of the exam to write out IP tables and a few items so I wouldn't have to think about it multiple times during the exam.

Good Luck.

texican

In addition to brushing up on WAN tech between now and then (plenty of time), just do a quick once-over of everything the morning of the test. I might also suggest some ****. These exams are not the end of the world. The testing center staff will not giggle and snicker with your test results before giving them to you if you fail. There aren't any big red flashing lights everytime you get an answer wrong. Stay positive, but as you go through the exam, keep a mental record of the things that are giving you trouble just in case you don't pass. It will give you an excellent starting point when you began to study again and can make a huge difference the second time around, if you need it.

Samin

thank u so much. now i really feel better .
i know failing the exam is not the end of world... but u know it's not easy for me to take the exam. i live in Iran and Cisco doesn't take the exams in iran, so i have to go to another country for it. that's why this exam will cost more than 150$ for me... and i don't want to fail...
thank u all.
congratulations Shimabuku

mikej412

I'm too late to offer advice -- but it would have been relax and use the time to study some more like others already said.

But I can ask -- are you home yet? Did you Pass?

Samin

thanks a lot.....
but i failed.... with 812
because of traveling, i could not sleep well... i was so nervous & tired and my exam was at 7pm....i was so nervous & tired. i wasn't ready for it at all.... i wasted my time on a lab i had just 10 mins for the last 10 questions and missed the last one....
it cost more than 1500$ for me... why i can not have this exam in iran??????????????

2lazybutsmart

Well I'm sorry to hear that Samin. Hope you do better next time.

But why did you spend 1500?

2lbs.

mikeyoung

Samin,

I feel for you. I don't think any of us can answer for Cisco about where they hold exams, but most of us have failed a test or two somewhere along the way and can relate to your current state of mine. I am guessing that the added costs were incurred due to travel and that is indeed unfortunate.

I would encourage you not to dispair too much and to get back in the study mode right away. You now know what to expect on the test now and you are still in learning mode. Hit your weak area as idenitified in your test results and practice on your simulater or cisco gear. You can do it!!!

Hang in there and good luck,

Mike

mikej412

I'm sorry you didn't pass.

Your having to travel for the test was something I thought about later. I then remembered some of the stories told by CCIE Lab Candidates and their travel adventures. Some of those stories and their advise might have helped with the travel side of your CCNA test.

You're 812 is close enough to definitely want to try again. Take what you have learned from this experience -- the travel, time management while taking the test, the tricky wording of the questions and figure out what you need to do next time. Then study the areas you felt you were weak in or didn't score well in according to your score report. Compare those area with the CCNA blueprint on the cisco web site to get an idea which area you may need to work on. Then relax, and study - study - study. And don't forget more lab work if you have access to routers/switches or a simulator.

Relax is still probably the best pre-test advise -- after you've studied as much as you can stand.

Two other pre-test tips that you may be able to use next time.

Read the Question -- completely and carefully.
Read ALL the answers -- don't jump at the first correct sounding/feeling answer.
Read the Question again.
Then pick the (right) answer(s).

Those questions with graphics and descriptive text -- I'd waste time reading the text and figuring out the graphic -- glance at the graphic and then jump to bottom of the text. The last sentence before the possible answers is usually the question. Once you know what the question is, you can pick out the information you need from the descriptive text and graphic.

Samin

thank u mikej412, thanks mikeyoung
ur advices are really helpful & i'm sure if i do everything u said, i could pass next time. u're right. it was an experience and i should learn from it. i'll do it next time
thanks all