ARCH Done - CCDP Now

IristheangelIristheangel Mod Posts: 4,133 Mod
Hello All,

I just finished this test up this morning. I've been studying on and off for the last 2.5 months.
Study material used:
INE Arch videos - Found this series to be pretty awesome
CCDP OCG - Great book. It goes into so much more detail than the actual exam covers. I'll be keeping this one on my Kindle for years to come just because some chapters will be useful depending on the situations I encounter in my professional career.

Overall, I felt a lot of the test was common sense for anyone who's had the experience of designing site build-outs. I think I learned a lot from the OCG book but not all of it was passed onto the test itself.

There are a lot of things changing in my life right now and that'll be a longer post in a few weeks. I'm excited for the next thing I'm studying for which will be CCNP Data Center and I'm about to get my hands on some amazing things.
BS, MS, and CCIE #50931
Blog: www.network-node.com

Comments

  • fredrikjjfredrikjj Member Posts: 879
    Congratulations.

    If you got the time, it'd be interesting to read a short summary of what you learned.
  • IristheangelIristheangel Mod Posts: 4,133 Mod
    Since I didn't add it in my original post, here are my notes from the Arch videos on INE:
    https://docs.google.com/document/d/15G_flt9UG_a3IOc1nd57LdPkfMlDN6DVG4c92v1NL-A/edit?usp=sharing

    Fredrikjj:
    I have been getting lazy with my posts lately. Much apologies.
    I probably wouldn't have even started studying for this test if it wasn't for someone getting me a Kindle for Christmas. I downloaded the CCDP book on it and just started reading it in bed when I woke up early or couldn't sleep at night. About halfway through the book, I was like "Alright, it's time for me to get serious about this" and it happened to coincide with my getting the All Access Pass at INE. I started watching the INE ARCH videos and probably got through them in 10 days. The book itself was a beast. Some of it was built on other concepts I studied, labbed or worked with in the real world such as the concepts around routing design, trunking, VTP, FHRPs, port channels, hierarchical network design, etc so it was naturally easier for me to "get it."
    I deal with Cisco wireless and our data center both at work and labbing on INE so it was nice to approach both from more of a design perspective than a configuration perspective. I'll probably experience it more in the CCNP Data Center materials but all the different firewall, service module and load balancing design concepts were sort of new to me but I actually found it easy to read. I wish I had taken notes on the book though but I was reading it in bed so I was utilizing the highlighter function of Kindle more than anything.
    The "Advanced WAN Services" chapter killed me. I still don't think I retained much on that chapter and thankfully it didn't pop up in the test or else I would have probably failed. My coworker and I were studying for this test at the same time and we could NOT remember all the crap from this chapter for the life of us.
    QoS and Multicast were probably my weaker areas before the exam and getting through both the book and the video REALLY helped cement both for me. I used to think of multicast as a magical unicorn that I didn't need to understand in as much detail. Boy, was I wrong! I'm actually working on strengthening myself on both by watching the Multicast and QoS video learning series on INE as followup. Whenever Anthony is doing them, it's actually easy to follow along and take notes but when Brian is doing the videos, he speaks pretty so fast that I'm constantly pausing and taking notes. I should add all my notes somewhere on here when I'm done with both video series.
    IPSec and SSL VPN design built off of what I already learned in Route.
    SAN design was fun - sort of built off of the CCNA Data Center and diving into what I'm planning on doing next which is the CCNP Data Center.

    Ironically, I think the book deep dives too much and doesn't focus as much on what is the exam. I think it's an EXTREMELY useful real-world reference but when you go through it for the purposes of taking the exam, you're going to drown in detail. Nothing wrong with that when you're looking to learn but MAN... That WAN design chapter did NOT need to be that long or with that much detail. *shudder*
    BS, MS, and CCIE #50931
    Blog: www.network-node.com
  • rtrefzrtrefz Member Posts: 26 ■□□□□□□□□□
    Congradulations.
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