CCNP Route Log

nothimagain

Decided on making a thread to log my progress and also hold myself accountable towards my goal of getting my CCNP . Right now im preparing for my first exam CCNP ROUTE. I studied for a month in March and then went on a hiatus. I started back up with my studies in August and have been going hard ever since. So far i've covered EIGRP/V6 ,OSPF/v3, and now finishing up route redistribution.

Ive been in the networking field for roughly a year and got my CCNA back in February. I work as Jr Net Engineer so im getting some real exposure on this stuff as well. Im trying to get all three exams done by March of next year and take my first test in December this year.

For study material i've been using the following:

CCNP Route OCG
INE CCNP Route and Switch video series
Kevin Wallace Videos from the OCG Book(Safari books has it for free)
Cisco Official Docs(whenever i feel like INE or the book didnt go deep enough)
CCIE TCP/IP books(when i feel like INE or the ocg didnt go deep enough)
GNS3 for most of my labbing
INE's CCNP workbook
Rack rentals(only when i want to do a lab from INE workbook)
but my main sources so far has been OCG and INE.

I usually study around 2-3 hours at work depending how many things we got going on and then another 2-3 hours at home. I havent been studying on weekends but thats changed as of last week. Ill also be doing 2-3 hours on Saturdays and Sundays.

EDIT UPDATE ON STUDY MATERAL:

For IPv6 and a lot of the other misc topics the book and the videos do NOT cover enough so i started to dive deeper by reading the following:

RFCs
IPv6 Fundamentals: A Straightforward Approach
Way More Cisco Doc,Whitepapers, and Configuration guides
Random Youtube videos

I know i might end up going a little deeper than i have to but one of my goals is to also achieve the CCIE right after my CCNP so either way im going to have to know this stuff .

PCTechLinc

I'm about to study for ROUTE to renew my CCNA that expires next September. I'm super cheap, so I try to get everything for free. Would you say you'd be able to study all the objectives just using GNS3?

nothimagain

PCTechLinc wrote: »

I'm about to study for ROUTE to renew my CCNA that expires next September. I'm super cheap, so I try to get everything for free. Would you say you'd be able to study all the objectives just using GNS3?

You should be fine with just GNS3 for the CCNP ROUTE. I know for SWITCH you'll probably want to get a rack rental,physical switches, or some how get your hands on the VIRL L2 Switch images.

So far i've been able to lab up everything ive learned on GNS3. I think when it gets time to do things like AAA configurations ill probably run into some issues. But so far so good.

PCTechLinc

Thanks for the advice. I knew I'd have to put some money down for SWITCH. Thankfully that's far enough in the future that I'll be able to save up. I also plan on seeing what I can do with Packet Tracer.

nothimagain

PCTechLinc wrote: »

Thanks for the advice. I knew I'd have to put some money down for SWITCH. Thankfully that's far enough in the future that I'll be able to save up. I also plan on seeing what I can do with Packet Tracer.

No problem.


I forgot to write my study method on my first post. Im using Onenote and Anki flashcards.

Anything that i read/watch i will turn into summarized notes. After completing a section or chapter , ill then convert all of my notes into flash cards. I like taking notes because i later easily go through them when i need to reference something and i like using flash cards because it helps you remember a lot of the smaller details like protocol type and small "gotchas" when it comes to Cisco IOS. Also helps me remember commands and the function of each protocol. Packetpushers has a great blog by this guy i follow who's studying for his CCIE on how to use the Anki Flash cards. Its a very strong tool in my opinion.

nothimagain

Just got finished studying for the night. After i finished everything at work i used my last 2 hours there to start working on some labs that i purchased from INE and i continued when i get home.

I honestly don't think the INE labs are worth 200$ bucks. Atleast not the CCNP Route ones. Ive found a couple errors in there and its convenient having to use the rack rentals since you have to load up the configs and it takes up time from ur block.. Dont get me wrong , they are helpful but a little over priced. I think before i take the route Exam im going to buy Bosons netsim instead.

Spent about 4-5 hours labbing up route redistribution between EIGRP,RIP, and OSPF . Also did some OSPFv3 and Named EIGRP.

nothimagain

I'm studying my least favorite topic on route at the moment: IPv6. I hate it so much. I rather learn 5 more new things than have to review IPv6 lol Anyways im just refreshing some of the IPv6 concepts i learned back in CCNA and then ill start diving into DHCP,SLAAC, and all the IPv6 Tunnels they included for the exam. It sucks because the INE videos i bought hardly cover IPv6 .

Hopefully i can focus on just IPv6 the rest of the month and move on to BGP in November. Seems like i might be able to take a crack at the test by Mid December if i keep this pace.

nothimagain

Did more work on IPv6 today. Spent most of it reading RFCs on Neighbor Discovery and DAD . After that i turned a bunch of my notes into Anki flash cards and then i did around 3 hours of Labbing EIGRP. Going to do the same. I think thats one of the hardest things about these exams. Keep everything you've learned fresh in your head. .

nothimagain

Spent most of my day again learning IPv6 theory and DHCP again. I think im getting to the point where i might going a little to deep so tomorrow im going to start labbing up all of things ive learned so far and then move on to IPv6 tunnels. Im starting to feel more comfortable with IPv6 after reading all those RFCs and Cisco White papers. Id say i spent 5 hours worth of studying today.

Jon_Cisco

Keep the updates coming. Sounds like you are keeping a good pace.

nothimagain

Jon_Cisco wrote: »

Keep the updates coming. Sounds like you are keeping a good pace.

will do man.

Today I'm doing a lot of labbing and going over Anki notes. I just finished doing the whole entire workbook portion for EIGRP . Now im going to lab up DHCPv6 and going over my Anki flash cards.Not doing any reading for new material today . Tomorrow ill probably do the same thing just to really get this in my head. So far i've spent 3 hours worth of studying today and plan on doing another 5 hours.

I know its not a race but i really want to get past the CCNP and start studying for the CCIE.

bhuwanp

CBT Nuggets IPv6 videos are good for IPv6 study.

nothimagain

bhuwanp wrote: »

CBT Nuggets IPv6 videos are good for IPv6 study.

My studying has been a little slow the past week and a half. Had some things come up and was a little busy with traveling but im back at it now. I just finished up most of IPv6 . All i need is:

RIPng , IPv6 ACLs, and Reverse Path Forwarding. But for now ima be taking a break on studying anything new when it comes to IPv6 and ima going to start focusing on BGP starting tomorrow.

I'm not sure if im going to be able to get my first attempt at the Route exam in December. I still havent covered L2 WAN , VPNs, Security, and Management. I know those are very small topics but i want to be 100 percent when i take the test. Might wait until January.