Failed CCNA, Slammed with Sims

tech671

Hi all,

I just failed CCNA for the first time, ran out of time with 8 questions to go. I got 5 difficult Sims, seven drag and drop. On my first Sim question which ate up 12 mins of my time. It was correction a fault on 3 routers with rip routing. I found the problem, it was a wrong ip address on a Serial 1/0, yes serial 1/0. I have never seen this before at least with study material and routers I have used. I tried to get into the interface by config t, s1/0 or Serial 1/0. I end up skipping the question. Is the sim wrong or I am wrong?
Please help, I am very confuse about this. Thanks

keenon

the CCNA sims required the whole command.. when doing any router work with routers not working first thing is to

1. id the problem
2. view the configs on the router(s) in question
3. fix the issue

tech671

Yes, I did all that, I made sure I was on the right mode, I was able get into Serial 0/1 and Serial 0/0 but not the Serial 1/0. It also had an interface Fa1/0 which I could not get into as well. I tried over and over when I realize I was killing my time, I click on next.

wildfire

Sorry to hear you failed,

carefull with the cisco NDA.

What score did you get?

other than the sims how were the questions?

If you think theory wise you did well, then just hammer the labs!

When you say serial 1/0 do you mean in the books you have only seen it as serial 1 ?


the / is used in slot based routers and switches for example the 36xx series routers have a series of slots. The first number represnts the port and second represents the port. On some of the bigger GSR routers Ive seen loads of /'s.

The command would simply be

Configure Terminal
Interface Serial 1/0
ip address ......

If it was a case of a bug in future you should use the comments box (bottom right) add a comment and make the Exam proctor aware!

Bugs are not unheard of Ive seen a few.

!30

Second time , go there prepared , better this is the only thing I can say to you.

And just relearn your weak point's dude and relax.

Good luck !

tech671

I think it's a bug with that question. I did made a commnent on it.

I got 681 score. Questions and answers were easy because I knew the theories well. I was suprise almost every question had diagrams I would say 80% of the questions which meant it required more time for analyzing. Lots of drag and drop. Your right I need more labs. I am using RouterSim 5.0, Sybex 5th, Fast Pass, Certsim and Redmond 3.0 for my exam sim. Studied hard for 2 straight months, 8-10 hours a day. At least I know what expect next time.

I am thinking of retaking it in 2 weeks.

JVE

It was not a bug in the question, to get into that interface you type

config t
interface serial1/0

but really you should try dynamips and dynagen together as that is as close to the real thing without having to buy the equipment. Do not get discouraged, but really you should practice a bit more on routers(dynamips)

Also, i know how you felt about the time, I went down to the wire, i had 3 minutes left when i hit finish! Read and practice and try again

david_r

2600FrameSwitch#show ip int brief
Interface                  IP-Address      OK? Method Status                Prot
ocol
Ethernet0/0                192.168.1.20    YES NVRAM  up                    down

Serial1/0                  unassigned      YES NVRAM  administratively down down

Serial1/1                  unassigned      YES NVRAM  up                    up

Nope, never seen that before This is a 2600 router with a NM-4a/s module installed. You need to treat it like any other interface. Wait until you see a POS interface. That one brought a smile to my face the first time I saw it.

EdTheLad

tech671 wrote:

I think it's a bug with that question. I did made a commnent on it.

I got 681 score. Questions and answers were easy because I knew the theories well. I was suprise almost every question had diagrams I would say 80% of the questions which meant it required more time for analyzing. Lots of drag and drop. Your right I need more labs. I am using RouterSim 5.0, Sybex 5th, Fast Pass, Certsim and Redmond 3.0 for my exam sim. Studied hard for 2 straight months, 8-10 hours a day. At least I know what expect next time.

I am thinking of retaking it in 2 weeks.

It sounds like you didnt prepare well,this exam isnt about reading facts and memorizing.You must understand the concepts and how they are realated to a real world environment.CCNA questions usually incorporate a couple of concepts per question, so understanding is essential.
Your study material is light, sybex is a nice read but it lacks depth on the different technologies, the fast pass will be even lighter.Maybe you should get the cisco press.Lastly read the blueprint for the exam on cisco website to be sure you have covered everything.

tech671

I just got the Cisco press library. I will do more hands on troubleshooting. Sybex was a great read it true it does lack in depth. RouterSim Netvis also lacks other commands. I have two routers one I purchased but without serial module I thought it came with it when I bought it and the other one my boss lend me. I was going cheap I did not want to spend extra on the Module. So I relied more on the router sim for my labs. thanks for encouragement.

marlon23

681 is very poor score (54%, becouse you can get from 300 as minimum to 1000) so I think you need a lot of study. Even if sim was wrong (and beleave me, when I tell that you was wrong) you have lost too much points. And becouse there is your signature under NDA, be carefull about what are you writing here.

Good luck nextime.

mikej412

It is possible it could have been a "test SIM" -- that's why no more than 10 minutes per sim is a good idea. That would also explain the "extra SIM" others have mentioned getting. On the CCNA, if you haven't gotten it in 10 minutes, you're probably not going to. I wasted 12-15 on a SIM once before I realized the scroll bar was 1 pixel high (and the graphic was oversized and off the screen) -- and it wasn't until after the exam I realized it probably was an ungraded "test SIM." I left lots of comments on that SIM that day.... (and it was easy once I found I could scroll and see the other Router and the rest of the IP Addresses).

But... assuming it was a real graded SIM -- when the command doesn't work, assuming it is a valid command -- re-read the instructions. On a CCSP SIM, where I had to accomplish 6 tasks, it wouldn't accept a valid command. When I reread the instructions, it said to do "step 3" before "step 4" -- and even though in real life I always do "step 4" before "step 3" (and the sequence really doesn't matter) -- the SIM was looking for step 3, and wouldn't let me do anything else until I finished that step. Annoying -- since that means the best I could have done would be 1/3 partial credit. I did "step 3," and then it let me finish.

Hushang

hey its ok, i failed my ccna my first time also i was weak in switching i went back and studied and passed it and yes it is possible to have s0/0 or fa0/0 or s0/1. and like someone said in a previous post you have to make sure u type out the full command:

router>enable
router#configure terminal
router(config)#interface serial0/0
router(config-if)#


and if you did that and it didnt work u may want to contact the people in charge of maintining the test there maybe a bug in the sim.

borumas

the / is used in slot based routers and switches for example the 36xx series routers have a series of slots. The first number represnts the port and second represents the port. On some of the bigger GSR routers Ive seen loads of /'s.

It could also be used in stacked switches, we have some 3700's that are stacked like that so switch one's fa ports start at fa1/1, switch two's 2/1, etc...