CCNP Switch - Day 1

Daniel333

Yo! Having a great day, in a great mood.

So I am home and got bored. I know I promised to take the month off IT studies. But I couldn't do it. My Switch books, new in plastic just waiting for me! So I shot awake at 8am and havn't stopped studying since.

I don't have access to a switch right now except a 2924xm and Packet Tracer. Shocked actually how much I can actually do. So far the only trouble I have had is layer-3 etherchannel and MST.

I just went and ordered a couple 3550's with poe. (I need to get back to my voice studies so I figured this was a good move). And I might get a couple 2950s later on.

Over all I have to say I am finding the material fun and most the material I either already knew. More or less just filling in gaps.

Probably the coolest thing I have seen yet is MST. I had no idea. So many switches I have setup incorrectly!!!

What I got done -
Foundation Learning Guide -
Chapter 1 (dryyyy!)

Video Mentor -
Labs 1-5 (much better than the routing series)

CCNP Switch Lab Manual -
Chapters 1 through 3 done!
Once I get my physical switches I am going to get creative with these labs. Actually play a game of mixing topologies together. That sort of thing.

I have a massive questions and answers PDF from CiscoKits but it's for exam 811 which is really dated at this point. Can't afford Trancender... at this time. Any others someone might recommend?

One more thing, and this is an odd question. Does anyone know how I might get to TOUCH a Cisco 6500? Are there trade shows? Open labs? Anything like that. So many jobs want you to know how to use these bad boys and I have never seen one. I would at least like to be able to know one if I see one.

jmc012

Daniel333 wrote: »

Yo! Having a great day, in a great mood.

One more thing, and this is an odd question. Does anyone know how I might get to TOUCH a Cisco 6500? Are there trade shows? Open labs? Anything like that. So many jobs want you to know how to use these bad boys and I have never seen one. I would at least like to be able to know one if I see one.

Daniel, just get good at the 3550's and 2600's, after all my lab work at home I felt right at home when I got the keys to the 6500's and 7609's at work. Even the Cisco 10k CMTS's don't seem that complicated, just have a lot of cable related commands to learn.

down77

You will be able to do most things with the 3550s with the exception of Private VLans and maybe one or 2 other features. I had no problems setting up MST on these and if you get the EMI license you can have a lot of fun in the home lab.

As far as touching a 6500, contact a Cisco Silver or Gold partner and ask if they will allow you to access their test lab, or at least walk you through it. You can also become familiar with the area Cisco Sales/Technical reps and see if they may provide some assistance. The 6500s are great toys! On a side note, I'm looking into taking a Nexus 7k course to start getting more familiar with this line of equipment. I've been able to play with the 5k, 4k, and 2k mostly for FC to FCoE and Top of the rack (or integrated into a blade chassis).

Good luck with SWITCH! I am hoping to complete this exam the 2nd week of Feb before tackling ARCH to complete the CCDP (assuming my BSCI still qualifies, I'll be breathing down the neck of the 3 year statute).

down77

jmc012 wrote: »

Daniel, just get good at the 3550's and 2600's, after all my lab work at home I felt right at home when I got the keys to the 6500's and 7609's at work. Even the Cisco 10k CMTS's don't seem that complicated, just have a lot of cable related commands to learn.

I would agree. Just remember that on the 3k series of switches you need to run "no switchport" to turn an interface into a layer 3 interface while the 6500 DEFAULTs the interface as a layer 3 meaning you have to run "switchport" for it to be layer 2. Gotta love cisco!

Daniel333

Thanks for the input guys. Coming along slow and steady.