CiscoPress CCNA Practice Exam Questions: WTF?
blentz
Member Posts: 3 ■□□□□□□□□□
in CCNA & CCENT
Greetings!
I am looking into getting my CCNA certification. I currently only hold A+ and RHCE, but have a full-time sys/netadmin job managing 6 Cisco routers, 5 real serial circuits and two unix-based firewalls (iptables & CP NG AI). The only routing protocol I've ever really used have been BGP. My internal routing environments have been static... so I can subnet classless networks pretty well (classful stuff is really lame... who has contiguous networks these days?). I took Microsoft Networking Essentials 8+ years ago and failed miserably, so I'm trying everything I can to not have a repeat when I go for my CCNA.
I have been studying with the CiscoPress INTRO and ICND materials for 5 days. I have been taking extensive (IMO) notes and have been doing the DIKT & Q&A questions for every chapter. I have also been taking the CCNA practice exams included on the CDROM, which have sparked some questions for this forum (which is the cream of the crop, from what I can tell!):
- Entering an ACL for a single host... shouldn't something like access-list 10 permit 192.168.0.1 0.0.0.0 be accepted? Doesn't an inverse mask of 0.0.0.0 mean "only this host"? I got the question wrong, it wanted the mask omitted for a single host ACL.
- Question w/QID199: Asks to establish an ACL on Router A's serial interface to block traffic from the LAN connected to Router B. No shell access is granted to Router B and the topo diagram includes only interfaces (serial/fe). How in the world am I supposed to know what's behind that other router's interface for which I can't shell into? Am I supposed to be psychic? I tried to be clever by pulling the routing table on Router B, subtracting the Connected interfaces, and seeing what's left (Assuming anything left was being advertised from router A)... but the damn thing was using RIP (classful
, and so the ACL I tried to create was subsequently too "large" (the actual remote network was a /24). Was I supposed to remember these address assignments from a previous question, and assume that they are the same for all subsequent questions? Most importantly, is the real Cisco CCNA test this cryptic?
- Question w/QID52: Shows a network behind a R3 router with fe interface 10.1.1.1/14 and a PC in that same segment with address 10.1.1.2, and no netmask specification. Reportedly, one of the correct answers is:
# When a new PC is added to the LAN off R3, it can be assigned any ip address between 10.0.0.1 and 10.3.3.254, inclusive, except for previously assigned IP addresses in that range.
Wait a minute. 10.3.**3**.254? Subnet math might be tough for some people, but doesn't a /14 mean 10.0.0.1 - 10.3.**255**.254? I didn't check that box because this range is broken, and I got the question wrong. GRRR
- Some other question (can't remember it's ID): had me configure a different ACL on a serial interface. The Interface was up and was assigned an address before beginning any work. So, I created the ACL, attached it to the interface, and hit Exit & Grade. I got it wrong. Why? Well, the Show Me button and/or answer required a (config-if) ip address and (config-if) no shutdown commands. Without these it was marked wrong. I checked it four times... each time I started with an up up interface, and each time I got the question wrong unless I assigned the ip address and did a no shutdown for NO APPARENT reason. WTF?
Please, somebody tell me: Am I horribly unprepared for the CCNA test, or am I the victim of
shoddy exam materials?
Many thanks in advance!
I am looking into getting my CCNA certification. I currently only hold A+ and RHCE, but have a full-time sys/netadmin job managing 6 Cisco routers, 5 real serial circuits and two unix-based firewalls (iptables & CP NG AI). The only routing protocol I've ever really used have been BGP. My internal routing environments have been static... so I can subnet classless networks pretty well (classful stuff is really lame... who has contiguous networks these days?). I took Microsoft Networking Essentials 8+ years ago and failed miserably, so I'm trying everything I can to not have a repeat when I go for my CCNA.
I have been studying with the CiscoPress INTRO and ICND materials for 5 days. I have been taking extensive (IMO) notes and have been doing the DIKT & Q&A questions for every chapter. I have also been taking the CCNA practice exams included on the CDROM, which have sparked some questions for this forum (which is the cream of the crop, from what I can tell!):
- Entering an ACL for a single host... shouldn't something like access-list 10 permit 192.168.0.1 0.0.0.0 be accepted? Doesn't an inverse mask of 0.0.0.0 mean "only this host"? I got the question wrong, it wanted the mask omitted for a single host ACL.
- Question w/QID199: Asks to establish an ACL on Router A's serial interface to block traffic from the LAN connected to Router B. No shell access is granted to Router B and the topo diagram includes only interfaces (serial/fe). How in the world am I supposed to know what's behind that other router's interface for which I can't shell into? Am I supposed to be psychic? I tried to be clever by pulling the routing table on Router B, subtracting the Connected interfaces, and seeing what's left (Assuming anything left was being advertised from router A)... but the damn thing was using RIP (classful
, and so the ACL I tried to create was subsequently too "large" (the actual remote network was a /24). Was I supposed to remember these address assignments from a previous question, and assume that they are the same for all subsequent questions? Most importantly, is the real Cisco CCNA test this cryptic?- Question w/QID52: Shows a network behind a R3 router with fe interface 10.1.1.1/14 and a PC in that same segment with address 10.1.1.2, and no netmask specification. Reportedly, one of the correct answers is:
# When a new PC is added to the LAN off R3, it can be assigned any ip address between 10.0.0.1 and 10.3.3.254, inclusive, except for previously assigned IP addresses in that range.
Wait a minute. 10.3.**3**.254? Subnet math might be tough for some people, but doesn't a /14 mean 10.0.0.1 - 10.3.**255**.254? I didn't check that box because this range is broken, and I got the question wrong. GRRR
- Some other question (can't remember it's ID): had me configure a different ACL on a serial interface. The Interface was up and was assigned an address before beginning any work. So, I created the ACL, attached it to the interface, and hit Exit & Grade. I got it wrong. Why? Well, the Show Me button and/or answer required a (config-if) ip address and (config-if) no shutdown commands. Without these it was marked wrong. I checked it four times... each time I started with an up up interface, and each time I got the question wrong unless I assigned the ip address and did a no shutdown for NO APPARENT reason. WTF?
Please, somebody tell me: Am I horribly unprepared for the CCNA test, or am I the victim of
shoddy exam materials?
Many thanks in advance!
Comments
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redgoblin
Member Posts: 57 ■■□□□□□□□□
It would appear that the materials you're using are a bit suspect. Anyway:
192.168.0.1 0.0.0.0 is usually written as host 192.168.0.1
address range 10.0.0.1 - 10.3.255.254 would appear to be right and the question wrong
The other tiddly bits seem to be problems with the actual material, but obviously without staring at the actual questions its a little hard to comment
HTH -
mikej412
Member Posts: 10,086 ■■■■■■■■■■
Double check Ciscopress.com and see if there are updates (or errata) available. You should be able to search there by ISBN number.:mike: Cisco Certifications -- Collect the Entire Set!