ICND1 Round 2

bender_fender100

I leave for my test in about two hours and got some good sleep last night. I've been doing some timed labs I downloaded and getting through those and getting everything right as far as the commands go and I watched a few videos from danscourses as some extra review and took some practice questions here on the site, made a 90 on the second set I took. I really believe that I have it this time and I'll be posting my results here when I get done with the exam.

I have also changed the way that I do my subnetting table. TWX had a great way of doing his that I found worked better for me than what I was doing before and can actually fit well on one page.

What I like about his chart is that it's also really easy to see how many subnets each specific address in a class has and knowing where to start doubling in case they ask me to find how many subnets this specific Class A or Class B address has very quickly and with just a little bit of math involved. Before I was writing out a long list of CIDRS on the right and going from there and thought it looked a lot less organized than the new table I'm doing. I can't think him enough and this forum for being such a great resource.

Once I get this over with, it's off to ICND2 hopefully and starting to buy some physical equipment for that.

CiscoWayne

Good luck man!

Let us know how you do.

What method did TWX use? Was it different to the one I posted on your other thread?

bender_fender100

CiscoWayne wrote: »

Good luck man!

Let us know how you do.

What method did TWX use? Was it different to the one I posted on your other thread?

It is, but it didn't take me too long to get used to it. It was a lot of the stuff I had already been doing with my own tables, but with less writing and with smaller columns.

My favorite part about it is the H+2 columns where I don't have to spend too much time trying to write out how many hosts each address has in another column when I can just subtract two from that section and get the same result, which thankfully I also learned a while ago from reading the Lammle book and doing all the problems that he had in there. Even the increments are listed, so it gets a lot of stuff right there on the page. I just need to double check my math when I get to the subnetting questions on the test so I won't make any careless mistakes.

bender_fender100

Ugh. I failed again, but with the same score and did worse in two categories. At least the network security device part I improved in because that was the one that I did the worst on last time, but it's really frustrating nonetheless. I also got really nervous when I sat down at the testing center. I think that also affected how I did. Without violating NDA, there were questions on a particular topic that I did not put as much emphasis on as what I had been looking at nor had I expected it to show up so much this time. Some of the questions I saw were familiar though.

I really feel like going at this even harder for the next few weeks, even if I have to reread whole chapters of things I thought I understood. I am also determined to get better at subnetting so I can try to get closer to a 100% on it because I really think that might have offset some of this.

Score: 775

Operation of IP Data Networks 33%
LAN Switching Technologies 55%
IP Addressing 67%
IP Routing Technologies 79%
IP Services 75%
Network Device Security 63%
Troubleshooting 71%

CiscoWayne

Aww that sucks man.

Keep at it and you'll defo get there. Don't give up.

Remember that famous saying, "Good things come to those who........keep trying"

bender_fender100

CiscoWayne wrote: »

Aww that sucks man.

Keep at it and you'll defo get there. Don't give up.

Remember that famous saying, "Good things come to those who........keep trying"

Thank you. I will be retaking it again either in December or January. Deathmage's story is very encouraging because he was in the same position I was in when he took the CCENT.

Do you think having some CompTiA certifications might help too, like the Network Plus? I'm really thinking about looking into one of them, just so I can have a foot in the door for now.

TWX

While you're fresh from sitting for it, without getting into too many details, what types of technology or concepts did you wince at or otherwise experience some issues with? Again, no specific questions, but given Operation of IP Data Networks and LAN Switching Technologies as your lowest points there had to be some questions where you knew there was a hole in your knowledge.

CiscoWayne

bender_fender100 wrote: »

Thank you. I will be retaking it again either in December or January. Deathmage's story is very encouraging because he was in the same position I was in when he took the CCENT.

Do you think having some CompTiA certifications might help too, like the Network Plus? I'm really thinking about looking into one of them, just so I can have a foot in the door for now.

At this point I don't see how CompTia will help you. Stick with the CCENT. I'd also try and get it done before January in my opinion. December is a lost month for many people, with christmas/christmas parties/christmas shopping/friends/family etc, you'll find it hard to continue studying through that. I know I did when I started studying for my CCENT last year.

bender_fender100

TWX wrote: »

While you're fresh from sitting for it, without getting into too many details, what types of technology or concepts did you wince at or otherwise experience some issues with? Again, no specific questions, but given Operation of IP Data Networks and LAN Switching Technologies as your lowest points there had to be some questions where you knew there was a hole in your knowledge.

Without getting too specific, I was not expecting to do worse in those categories. I tried placing a lot of emphasis on switching especially and assumed that the IP Data Networks questions would be just like the first time I took it and made a 100 there. It's sometimes a bit hard for me to visualize what happens when I'm looking at some kind of topology like for a switch and I thought I had that right before going in. It has always been my weakest area for me. Lastly there were several questions on the exam that were worded in quite a weird way to me that it was easy to get confused. Some of it felt more like the Boson practice exam.

Also, there were concepts in IP that I felt like I didn't go over as throughly as I thought, like DHCP. I filled up nearly half a notebook with notes, so it's not that I'm not writing down anything when I study.

bender_fender100

CiscoWayne wrote: »

At this point I don't see how CompTia will help you. Stick with the CCENT. I'd also try and get it done before January in my opinion. December is a lost month for many people, with christmas/christmas parties/christmas shopping/friends/family etc, you'll find it hard to continue studying through that. I know I did when I started studying for my CCENT last year.

I was asking mainly because I thought that would at least get something from that in terms of a first IT job. I'm almost finished with college and studying information systems.

CiscoWayne

bender_fender100 wrote: »

I was asking mainly because I thought that would at least get something from that in terms of a first IT job. I'm almost finished with college and studying information systems.

It's up to you mate. Everyone's different, got different experiences etc.

You've put a lot of time into the CCENT, so my personal advice is don't give up now you're so close. If after the CCENT you want to try something else, to get you into that help desk job, then go for it, but I think you'd be best off finishing the CCENT first.

bender_fender100

CiscoWayne wrote: »

It's up to you mate. Everyone's different, got different experiences etc.

You've put a lot of time into the CCENT, so my personal advice is don't give up now you're so close. If after the CCENT you want to try something else, to get you into that help desk job, then go for it, but I think you'd be best off finishing the CCENT first.

I agree and I still wanted to try to go in the CCNA direction and look into security after that. I really hope ICND2 is more about configurations because I feel like I can do better at that than the kinds of questions that are on ICND1. I've read a lot here that it's difficult, but I'd be up for the challenge anyway.

I am really close and I know exactly what's going on. If I just got a little better at subnetting quicker and with more accuracy and just brushed up on some earlier concepts and drilled switching topics more, I could probably pass the next time.

CiscoWayne

bender_fender100 wrote: »

I agree and I still wanted to try to go in the CCNA direction and look into security after that. I really hope ICND2 is more about configurations because I feel like I can do better at that than the kinds of questions that are on ICND1. I've read a lot here that it's difficult, but I'd be up for the challenge anyway.

I am really close and I know exactly what's going on. If I just got a little better at subnetting quicker and with more accuracy and just brushed up on some earlier concepts and drilled switching topics more, I could probably pass the next time.

Just chill for the rest of the day and I bet tomorrow you'll feel way better.

"Without failure, there is no success"

TWX

The test I took and almost but didn't pass was the combined. That said, it sounds like your weakest areas are mostly Layer 2. Please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

Some questions for you to consider...

How do Ethernet networks without Switches work?
What did the introduction of the Bridge do for Ethernet networks?
What did the introduction of the Switch do for Ethernet networks?
What causes collisions? What do network devices do when a collision occurs?
What technology mitigates collisions? What conditions are necessary for this?
At what layer of the OSI model and of the TCP/IP model do various protocols reside?
What is a MAC address? How do higher-level protocols make use of this?
What is the discrete data unit in a given layer called? What is the term for the process of moving data units between layers?
Where are the possible places that error checking could be performed?

Just some examples. Again, you might already know this stuff down pat, but those are the kinds of things that relate to this area, I think. I don't doubt that there are more.

bender_fender100

CiscoWayne wrote: »

Just chill for the rest of the day and I bet tomorrow you'll feel way better.

"Without failure, there is no success"

Very true. It's not the end of the world that I didn't pass this time, because I've proven to myself that I can do it. It's not about whether I will get it or not, but a matter of when.

TWX

CiscoWayne wrote: »

Just chill for the rest of the day and I bet tomorrow you'll feel way better.

I second this. I am not proud of my behavior the day I failed my exam, some stuff ended up going into the garbage can as a result of my desire to vent my frustration.

bender_fender100

TWX wrote: »

The test I took and almost but didn't pass was the combined. That said, it sounds like your weakest areas are mostly Layer 2. Please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

Some questions for you to consider...

How do Ethernet networks without Switches work?
What did the introduction of the Bridge do for Ethernet networks?
What did the introduction of the Switch do for Ethernet networks?
What causes collisions? What do network devices do when a collision occurs?
What technology mitigates collisions? What conditions are necessary for this?
At what layer of the OSI model and of the TCP/IP model do various protocols reside?
What is a MAC address? How do higher-level protocols make use of this?
What is the discrete data unit in a given layer called? What is the term for the process of moving data units between layers?
Where are the possible places that error checking could be performed?

Just some examples. Again, you might already know this stuff down pat, but those are the kinds of things that relate to this area, I think. I don't doubt that there are more.

Yeah that seems to be the biggest problem for me. It's not that I don't know anything about the OSI layer, but I always found Layer 2 topics to be the hardest to fully grasp and understand and I'm not sure why. Routing, subnetting (even though I can still improve here), troubleshooting, show commands, configurations are a lot easier for me to get since I did exactly the same on all those categories.

I'm not mad or anything but I think after taking these exams, it's a good thing that I know exactly where I keep having problems and that it's specifically on one main issue.

TWX

Well, if you have IP addressing down, then stop worrying about studying it in-depth compared to the other topics.

When I built my home lab I was weak in VLSM. As a result I used all kinds of subnetting and used addresses whose ranges I was not comfortable with (ie, 172.16.0.0/12) to force myself to learn it.

For some reason, compared to my coworkers I get spanning-tree. I suppose it's in part from chasing own loops as an infrastructure tech due to improperly implemented spanning-tree, but regardless I don't seem to struggle with it as much as they do. On the other hand, I totally screwed up an ACL question on my exam even though I thought I was good with ACLs.

One of the things that I'm annoyed with is that in several cases the curriculum has used the new-way of doing something, but the exam uses the old-way. Routing protocols come to mind, depending on the version of IOS one may define interfaces to enable the protocol upon through the routing protocol configuration mode or through the interface configuration mode, or both. The old way is through the routing protocol config, the new way is through the interface config. Most of the curriculum used the new way, while there was still plenty asked of the old way. Same goes for ACLs, there was more emphasis on "ip access-list standard/extended name/number" to go into the ACL config mode than there was to configure ACLs through global config the hard way, but the global config method was more prominent on the exam. There even were questions on the old way of accessing the VLAN database that is essentially deprecated, which is REALLY annoying. I had to service some 3500XL switches though, so I had seen it in the wild, but it's uncommon on anything even close to modern.

bender_fender100

That's how I thought when I was going back and studying. I was trying to go through every single thing according to the Cisco blueprint and I was doing some more subnetting practice the last two days before the test, still thinking it would be the category I needed to give a lot of attention but it wasn't and looking at how I approached it, I know that's where I went wrong again. If I have the subnetting table all there and remember the basic rules and logic behind it, then I know that I'm gonna consistently get the same results in the category.

I'm questioning about whether the subnetting questions are weighted as much as some of the other categories. If they're not, then that will make it even easier for me to just focus on Layer 2 and switching topics, and maybe taking another look at Telnet and SSH again. The first time as you saw I made a 64% on the category.

With IP addressing, I completely understand what Class A, Class B, and Class C addresses are and how subnets work and all of that, so again you have a good point.

Markioa1983

Hi Guys,

Can someone inform me of the TWX subnetting chart?

I am really struggling with subnetting and I'm hoping this help.

Thanks in advance.

TWX

Markioa1983 wrote: »

Hi Guys,

Can someone inform me of the TWX subnetting chart?

I am really struggling with subnetting and I'm hoping this help.

Thanks in advance.

This is what I wrote:

http://www.techexams.net/forums/ccna-ccent/115034-subnetting-braindump-chart.html

Some people like it, some people don't. It takes a lot of space to write-out, but on the other hand it gives one a whole lot of information that can be useful.

I tend to do well learning when I write-out what I learn. I wrote all of this out several times a day over several days and basically just memorized most of it on account of that.

stunnedsoup

Hang in there buddy. You should be proud for giving it a valiant shot. However, that being said, you can use it as motivation to crush it the next time! I'm in the middle of studying right now and am glad I found these forums. This may sound weird but I'd like to thank you (and everyone else) for sharing your journey. Being a part of this forum for about a week now has really given me a ton of useful information.

Anyway, as I mentioned earlier, keep your head up, take a quick breather (for a day or two), and hop back on that bull!

bender_fender100

stunnedsoup wrote: »

Hang in there buddy. You should be proud for giving it a valiant shot. However, that being said, you can use it as motivation to crush it the next time! I'm in the middle of studying right now and am glad I found these forums. This may sound weird but I'd like to thank you (and everyone else) for sharing your journey. Being a part of this forum for about a week now has really given me a ton of useful information.

Anyway, as I mentioned earlier, keep your head up, take a quick breather (for a day or two), and hop back on that bull!

Thank you. While I'm still kinda feeling bummed out, at the same time, my drive to nail it has only grown. Tomorrow and onward, it's lots of Boson practice exams, a lot more reading on layer 2 and switching material, and daily subnetting problems until I get to where I want to be and then I'll reschedule for a retake. I am not about to let my hard work go to waste just because there was a recurring weakness that's preventing me from passing at the moment. I also think I overstudied for the exam in some ways, like going through half a notebook on all the videos I watched and taking excessive notes. For those practice exams, I will be doing them on learning mode, taking good notes on the explanations for why I keep getting certain questions and wrong and take it from there.

I now understand what it's like to really work hard at something and still fail. Before I was very used to always doing well on tests and exams for college, but this has really pushed me to experience things I hadn't been through that often before.

stunnedsoup

bender_fender100 wrote: »

Thank you. While I'm still kinda feeling bummed out, at the same time, my drive to nail it has only grown. Tomorrow and onward, it's lots of Boson practice exams, a lot more reading on layer 2 and switching material, and daily subnetting problems until I get to where I want to be and then I'll reschedule for a retake. I am not about to let my hard work go to waste just because there was a recurring weakness that's preventing me from passing at the moment. I also think I overstudied for the exam in some ways, like going through half a notebook on all the videos I watched and taking excessive notes. For those practice exams, I will be doing them on learning mode, taking good notes on the explanations for why I keep getting certain questions and wrong and take it from there.

I now understand what it's like to really work hard at something and still fail. Before I was very used to always doing well on tests and exams for college, but this has really pushed me to experience things I hadn't been through that often before.

This reminds me of my past. I have taken exams through VUE before for the previous field I was in several years ago. I needed to get licensed up on a few areas. The whole test center experience was completely different to me than testing in college (like you said). My 1st ever licensure exam I failed 3 times before passing it. The first time I missed a pass by 2 questions and the second and third times I missed it by 1 question...1 question! I was so mad I didn't want to talk to anyone, let alone my boss! I was so embarrassed. The most frustrating and crushing part was that I knew all the material inside and out but just couldn't crack the questions on the exam. To make a somewhat long story short, I studied my butt off for a week straight and kept telling myself "I refuse to fail a 4th time! I refuse to leave that testing room on the 3rd floor and enter the elevator with a paper that says FAIL! I refuse to call my boss again to tell him that he needs to shell out another 'x' amount of dollars for a retake!" The night before my 4th try I had a dream where I kept telling myself that I will pass only if I have confidence and determination (both of which I lacked in all my previous attempts). Went into the testing center with drive and grit...no nerves at all. I ended up finishing the exam in like 30 minutes (allowed 75min) and passing.

Never let bumps in the road stop you from reaching your destination!

mikeybinec

It appears you are having issues with sub netting. Those should be gimmes when you see them

bender_fender100

mikeybinec wrote: »

It appears you are having issues with sub netting. Those should be gimmes when you see them

I can and have proven to myself that I could do subnetting in my head, even today doing some of the exercises on the subnetting website. I noticed that it's always the same thing no matter what the address class is, it's just knowing where to start and going from there. What I think I may be having problems with is certain questions where they go beyond just asking about valid host ranges, addresses, etc. Between that and layer 2 stuff, I'm having much more trouble with layer 2 topics than subnetting itself. I also know that I have done some of the VLSM Odom simulator questions and didn't have much of an issue getting those correct. I also swear there was one subnetting question on the exam that I may have made a careless mistake on when I remember it but I was also getting really nervous for some reason that time.

The table I have no problem with coming up with from my head either. Do you have any suggestions? After thinking about it, I'll be taking some time off from CCENT for the rest of the week and come back to it next week when I have break off from school but I will still do some subnetting questions online everyday, which I haven't been doing as of late, though I do write out the subnetting table itself when I'm somewhere like in class. It was also strange to me that I didn't improve or lower my score in IP addressing whatsoever on the second attempt.

TallDude7

did you write out the subnetting chart? remember switches deal with only MAC addreses. routers deal with MACs and IP addresses

bender_fender100

TallDude7 wrote: »

did you write out the subnetting chart? remember switches deal with only MAC addreses. routers deal with MACs and IP addresses

Yes I did. I wrote out the whole thing from memory. Everything from CIDR 8 to even CIDR 32 as TWX had in his chart.

bender_fender100

Even though I was feeling down yesterday, I'm feeling a lot better today and I've been thinking about a new strategy that I'm gonna try to use to really improve my chances of passing the next time. With the couple of subnetting problems I will be doing each day from my head without looking at anything, I will take all the Boson practice exams on learning mode and seeing why I keep getting specific questions wrong and paying close attention to the explanations, writing them down carefully. I will go from there, read thoroughly on the things I keep having problems with, watch some of the videos on the topic again and again until I get it down to my memory, and then retake those Boson exams in simulation mode until I start getting close to making a passing score on all of them. Then I will reschedule for another retake once I get that taken care of. Before, I thought I had been fully confident that I had improved my skills and that I wouldn't need to rely on the Boson exams themselves to help me, but the last test I took felt harder than the first time. I hope this plan might be the best way for me to tackle something like this head on and I feel that lots of repetition will help. My highest score on a Boson exam without having to go back and retake any questions has been a pitiful 625 and I want to change that. My real CCENT score was 125 points greater, so I'm gonna realistically aim for a 679 at first for them, and then keep going from there. That is my own theory on the Boson exams. If I can score greater than a 700 and get as close to an 800 on those, I'll have a much better chance of passing the real exam.

I just need to get some other stuff done today, and then get right back into it this week and next week and see how that goes. I'm constantly experimenting with different approaches to my studying and seeing what works and what hasn't

bender_fender100

Here's how I've been doing on subnetting entirely from my head while playing the subnetting game and how many I was able to answer correctly without looking at any kind of chart in 5 minutes. I've been doing these exercises a little bit per day. I'm slowly getting used to being able to figure more difficult subnet numbers and host numbers too. I'm hoping it will make somewhat of a difference.

james43026

bender_fender100 wrote: »

Ugh. I failed again, but with the same score and did worse in two categories. At least the network security device part I improved in because that was the one that I did the worst on last time, but it's really frustrating nonetheless. I also got really nervous when I sat down at the testing center. I think that also affected how I did. Without violating NDA, there were questions on a particular topic that I did not put as much emphasis on as what I had been looking at nor had I expected it to show up so much this time. Some of the questions I saw were familiar though.

I really feel like going at this even harder for the next few weeks, even if I have to reread whole chapters of things I thought I understood. I am also determined to get better at subnetting so I can try to get closer to a 100% on it because I really think that might have offset some of this.

Score: 775

Operation of IP Data Networks 33%
LAN Switching Technologies 55%
IP Addressing 67%
IP Routing Technologies 79%
IP Services 75%
Network Device Security 63%
Troubleshooting 71%

Looks like the three areas you really need to concentrate on are, LAN switching, IP routing, and troubleshooting, those three combined are 60% of the test as far as points are concerned, device security is another 10%, you could study more on that too. IP addressing and network operations are only 10% combined, so I wouldn't sweat those.