Is CCNA Intimidating to others?

Noerc

So far I am wrapping up the final studys of ICND1 and moving to ICND2. Recently when I was going over somethings and I kinda had a scared feeling that hit me and I was like wow....if this seems to be hard to understand I can't imagine going higher into the networking side. Has anyone else felt intimidated by Cisco's side?

ThunderPipe

Oh yeah... Back when I was preparing for the tests I was pretty intimidated. It's normal. One thing I know, is if you know you're stuff, you're gonna be good to go. When I took ICND2, I wasn't too keen on my Frame Relay or my IPv6 knowledge. And I payed for it when I failed the exam. When I read up on my weak points, it was in the bag. The hardest part is the multiple topics. You have to learn and remember so many different things. But you'll get it. I hated failing that first time, but I INSTANTLY knew what areas I needed to learn, and what areas I was solid in. VTP, VLANS, Frame Relay, IPv6, OSPF, EIGRP, Subnetting, RIP... So many topics. Some people buy practice tests. Meh, I'd go take the exam and skip the practice tests. Same price basically, but you get the real thing. And you can study what you miss and get a print out of your topics and % in each. I feel like I'm rambling. It's early. LOL.

tr1x

I was intimated by ICND1 at first because I was new to Cisco.. then I took it and it was pretty easy, now I'm looking forward to ICND2. The higher level exams like CCNP seem pretty intimidating though, but I don't think they would if I had some job experience working on the equipment.

Somnipotent

tr1x wrote: »

I was intimated by ICND1 at first because I was new to Cisco.. then I took it and it was pretty easy, now I'm looking forward to ICND2. The higher level exams like CCNP seem pretty intimidating though, but I don't think they would if I had some job experience working on the equipment.

on the contrary, the CCNP level exams are EASIER in the sense that they are more focused on what they test for. CCNA, for me, was the hardest hill so far.

jamesleecoleman

The ICND2 is a tough exam. I've never been intimidated by Cisco certification because I'm learning stuff I want to learn.
The ICND2 can take a little longer to learn the material. It took me longer to learn ICND2 material compared to the ICND1 material just because there were more things.

The things that look intimidating are intimidating just by looking at them. When you start working on it, it doesn't
seem so intimidating anymore.

psenior

I wouldn't use the word "intimidated." I would say it was challenging. I don't like to psyche myself out by thinking something is difficult. You can learn a lot when you study consistently over time, breaking the info into manageable chunks.

The nice thing about passing was that I started to feel confident in my ability to successfully pass just about any other certification exam out there. And you get a lot of recognition and congratulations from your peers in the IT industry because they know it's not easy.

headshot

Without a doubt I would say hell yeah it is. To me it seems like the biggest jump is to go from very little knowledge (how to setup your basic SOHO network) to the breadth of knowledge required in the CCNA. Thankfully the subnetting came naturally so that eased the burden.

drkat

I took the CCNA 640-802 / It's a tough test with the chance that at any turn you can have ANY question thrown at you. Intimidation kept me from taking it for awhile.. and even though it took 3 tries... It's done, behind me and I'll never have to take that test again.... if I maintain my CCNP status once I get it lol

alliasneo

For sure, these are tough exams. When I started studying ICND1 I had absolutely no networking experience at all and I was just totally overwhelmed with everything. right down to what an ip address was. But I made a decision to stick at it and I just thought 'well I can only tackle on subject at a time and hopefully this stuff will start coming together' and it eventually it did. Now I'm studying for the CCNP Switch exam.

Noerc

Thanks for the inspiration everyone, I kinda thought it was just me. Cisco is deffinitely a whole different type of beast in the IT world when just starting out. I learn through watching CBTNuggets (which are freaking awesome) and just recently finding this awesome site to help top of some weak points from the advice of others! I'll be attempting the 802 here in little over a month, can't wait to tackle it!

docrice

It's not that "Cisco" is intimidating, but the subject of networking in general can be difficult to grasp because it's not operating system management which more people generally have interactive experience with. Networking topics can seem abstract at first. To be honest, once you start working in the networking field, you'll realize the CCNA doesn't really teach you all that much. There's much more to be learned. The digital domain is very complicated with a ton of moving parts.

Cisco just happens to be the more popular certification track due to the market share they command, but there are others out there like Juniper. The CCNA should teach you enough solid fundamentals which can be applied to just about any other vendor though. All networking equipment vendors tend to share the same concepts in feature-sets. One of the reasons the CCNA is perceived as difficult (apparently it was a lot easier ten years ago) is due to the breadth of subjects covered. It's worth the effort to grind through.

After going through a lot of certification exams, I tend to not like vendor-specific certifications as much anymore since most of them are pretty much "this is the button to push to do this" type coverage. If you work with a particular vendor equipment, then it's fine, but in a multi-vendor environment it's a bit less applicable. But the CCNA I think is still good to go through. In some ways, I think even sysadmin folks should do it as it'll expand their understanding beyond the interfaces of the machines they're managing.

drkat

I'd like to add that once you get over the CCNA, everything will appear "easier" whether or not it's relevant or not. The CCNA is such a broad test as your CCNP level tests are more focused.

NOC-Ninja

I believe that anything unknown is intimidating. This is how I felt when I was studying for CCNA.

YFZblu

Yeah, it is. For me ICND2 was especially intimidating. With ICND1 I felt like if you knew subnetting and how frames and packets traverse a small LAN, you'd be OK. ICND2 introduces a myriad of new topics...STP, VTP, EIGRP, OSPF ACLs, Frame Relay, IPv6, etc...Certainly a lot to cover for a noob.

GOZCU

ahh, i decided to take a certificate from the cisco when i had no idea about networking. Even i didn't know what is an IP or what is a hub... imagine how hard for me it was at the beginning