Reddit mentions of CCNA Cisco Certified Network Associate

Hi! I'd just like to recommend this site www.professormesser.com it has a great series of videos for Network+. I take it you'll probably go on to do the CCNA afterwards? I'm not really aware of any online courses but going the self study route is very doable. For the CCNA I'd recommend Todd Lammle's book. And here's a series of CCNA video tutorials.

Also get your hands on Packet Tracer, as /u/Immuchtooawesome suggested, it's a great little network simulator that you can use for practicing the basics.

As for getting your foot in the door, I'm in the same position so I won't presume to offer any advice there!

Public school is free and community college is nearly free (assuming you qualify for federal aid, and you probably do). If you didn't take advantage of your free high school education, you made a very poor choice and you're certainly going to have a harder time. But those are consequences of your own choices.

If you moved out of your parents' home as soon as possible just because you wanted to be "free and independent" and now you can't afford school because you have bills to pay, those are consequences of your own choices.

Also, believe it or not, you can learn things by yourself. I taught myself computer networking with this book and some Googling. I went and got a Cisco Certification, and now I have a career earning $10K above the average for my area. It took maybe 6 months for me to do this and I had no outside help or cost beyond the book and the cost of the exam ($300).

If I needed another career I would take my state's electrician exam (after studying, of course). They generally make good money and are always in demand. Or I would learn to repair Ducati motorcycles. They're a very expensive, very popular brand of motorcycle in my area and few people know how to fix them. The dealers charge $150 an hour for labor and half of that goes to the tech. So if you spent a few months learning the engine you could be making $70 an hour.

Obviously I'm of a technical mindset and my choices reflect that, but you get the idea.


This why all those people make the "bootstraps" argument. I know it's often bullshit, but the idea is that many people - not ALL, but many - just aren't being resourceful or trying very hard. They drop out of high-school or college because it was too hard or too expensive and then just give up and claim that they need help. There are lots and lots of things you can do once you realize that going to Harvard isn't going to pan out.

If we're going to help the impoverished, I think the solution is not just paying them more. It's making education available to them so that they can learn a valuable skill or trade. I'm all for training programs and the like. But doubling the pay of fry-cooks just because is not going to fix anything. We have to figure out why, in your 30 years of life, you never learned anything other than how to cook fries, and then we have to fix that.

I'm currently studying for the CCNA exams. Todd Lammle's book was recommended to me as a study guide and I've found it to be a valuable resource. Also, check out /r/ccna.

Im currently going through my CCNA, Iv found the Sybex book to be the best, It was also suggested to me by a few co-workers who are already CCNA Holders.

Heres the one im using:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/CCNA-Certified-Network-Associate-640-802/dp/0470901071/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1325261519&sr=8-1

EDIT.
Also, get yourself a copy of GNS3, if you need the IOS's give me a shout.

The CCNA one is in very high demand. I took part in a lecture held by Todd Lammle at Birmingham City University a few months ago. He basically said the best jobs to get into right now are communications, virtualization and web aplication development. It's kind of obvious really considering the trend towards cloud computing, on demand services and most importantly converged networks.

If you want to do the CCNA I would recommend skipping CompTIA N+ all together. But be warned CCNA is not something you can jump into that easily. From my experience, which isn't that much but it is a little, best books for the CCNA are the ICND1, ICND2 and Todd Lammle's CCNA Study Guide. I strongly recommend taking a course for the CCNA as the practice is not easily achieved at home (lack of equipment unless you have money to spend on second hand cisco routers, switches, cables, etc.).

Other than that, best of luck!

As for the Microsoft ones... meh, a book and a few virtual machines should get you sorted.

Check out GNS3, it's a great practice routing tool which works with IOS (Cisco) and Junos (Juniper) very easily. You can set up and test all kinds of configurations. I'd suggest Todd Lammle's CCNA Guide for not only a good introduction to Cisco but to networking in general.

I am currently using this.

http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Certified-Network-Associate-CD-ROM/dp/0470901071/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1333408913&sr=8-1

READ

Network+ Cert Guide

Cisco CCNA

Network Warrior

Packet Life


WATCH

How to use/install GNS3

CBTNuggets (Paid Training)

DO

GNS3

Packet Tracer + Labs (torrent)

Cisco CCNA Study Group

9tut.com Labs

Talk to an IT Recruiter

TekSystems

Tech Team

Robert Half


These are just a few examples, many more exist. Good luck!

Nope.

I'm talking about this one.

There are some slight errors in the questions, but they're pretty negligible (if you know what you're doing, you'll notice them and question the answers they give you). Also, another great resource is the CNNA command book (from Cisco press), especially if you have access to routers/switches.

I went right for the CCNA. Took me two tries - missed by four points the first time, which really sucked, but them's the breaks.

Hands-on experience is absolutely vital, because the Cisco exams require you to know both theory and application. If you can get your hands on Packet Tracer, GNS3, or any reasonably recent equipment, I would strongly advise playing with that. Since your time on the test is limited, you can't be thinking about command syntax. It pretty much has to be automatic.

I had a bit of previous experience prior to actually taking the test, but I found Todd Lammle's book quite helpful.

Literally this and packet tracer is all you need to get your CCNA:

http://www.amazon.com/Certified-Network-Associate-Deluxe-Edition/dp/0470901071

Once you have that you are qualified to get a basic level networking job from there and then your knowledge and opportunities are endless!

I don't know really. I have the CCNA and CCNA Security, but I also work with Cisco products and deal with security on a daily basis so my study-time will be skewed. I would say I spent an average of 3-4 hours a day reviewing material for a month before I took it. I would flip-through the exam cram book on my lunch break and spend some time at home in my own lab playing around. This book is pretty good. If you've never touched IOS, maybe jump on ebay and look at a used switch and router...

If you are going to pursue the single CCNA test, you should definitely get Tod Lammle's CCNA Study guide. He writes some of the best books for self study.

http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Certified-Network-Associate-640-802/dp/0470901071/ref=ntt_at_ep_dpt_1

If you are going to pursue the 2 test route for CCNA, here are the books to get.

ICND 1

http://www.amazon.com/CCENT-Certified-Networking-Technician-640-822/dp/0470247029/ref=pd_sim_b4

ICND 2

http://www.amazon.com/ICND2-Official-Certification-640-816-640-802/dp/158720181X/ref=pd_bxgy_b_text_c

If you can, sign up for the Cisco Net Academy, it's a great course.

The CCNA book by Todd Lammle is AMAZING.
Read it. every. day.
Also Youtube. You can find vids on literally everything and its FREE.

CCNA Study Guide by Todd Lammle

pay attention to what edition they are, as an example, Lammle's CCNA book is up to the 7th edition, but you can still find and buy the 6th edition on amazon.

it take a few minutes to find the right ones, but you can sort them out if you play "spot the difference"

this is the one i have and am working through, definitely recommended:
Llamle - 7th edition

Maybe you're right,i should play more with cisco equipment.Is packet tracer enough or should I buy some routers ?I already know most of the protocols from this book: https://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Certified-Network-Associate-Study/dp/0470901071 since I've finished it about 5 days ago.

EDIT:The reason for not joining one of the big companies is that they prefer university graduates a LOT more and that there are maybe two of them in a 300km radius(other than phone cell companies i mean-which most of them don't provide home internet).

check out my colleges course material online, itt.century.edu, Network Fundamentals 1,2,3 and Network Integration correspond to CCNA1-4 respectively. I used that course material for all of my CCNA courses, If you want to learn about security try looking at :

ITT-2020 Network Security Fundamentals


ITT-2025 Firewalls and Network Security

Do this security stuff after going through the CCNA stuff or else you'll be lost

Also here's the latest Packet Tracer software (5.3.2) along with the tutorial, Please note there may be certain things that you cannot do with the packet tracer software in the CCNA curriculum (I believe there's some CCNA4 stuff)
(packet tracer)
http://www.mediafire.com/?477o7btmzdw7sig

I would also reccommend the book here:


http://www.mediafire.com/?2i8nijmfna8ad1r

It's the cisco command guide for the CCNA curriculum, it helps if you are configuring something and can't remember the command.
If you want to have something to go hand in hand and be a side reference, I would reccomend Todd Lammle's Book here:


http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Certified-Network-Associate-CD-ROM/dp/0470901071/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1320860539&sr=8-1

One of my teachers recommends this book for his CCNA1 course because you will use it all through the courses.



Hope this helps! good luck!

This post is Cisco-centric.

Books:

http://www.amazon.com/Interconnections-Bridges-Switches-Internetworking-Protocols/dp/0201634481/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1318854135&sr=8-1

http://www.amazon.com/Cisco-Certified-Network-Associate-640-802/dp/0470901071/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1318854213&sr=8-1

Website of someone I know and I'm very impressed by:

http://www.stubarea.net/workbooks/cisco/ccna/

I've seen it mentioned before though. Some quick searching found

CCNA cheat sheet packed with iOS commands

Guy studying for CCNA asking how to memorize commands

CCNA study book that covers how to configure Cisco hw, which I'm assuming requires some use the CLI

More study guides that cover iOS

Guy says test covers time-limited simulations that require knowing exact commands