Its sunday morning almost 8am in Brisbane. Awake since 5:30am, had my usual coffee and cereal while everybody else is asleep. I am already holding on to my highlighter pen, reading my ccnp materials while watching youtube. Has this become an addiction already? I believe I am starting to lose a life here where all i do is study. It can be challenging sometimes when a thought would come in saying is it all worth it? Is it worth all this time putting up other things and just prepare yourself to an exam happening in less than 3 months?

This would have been better if I have a job. A job that revolves around networking but the fact is I am still a TAFE student. Studying my butt off over something that I hope will be of good use. 

Anyway as an update, I’ve finally understood IPv6 completely (i think) with all the routing and stuff. I have to work on a lot of stuff, going through the practice exams I am still clueless. ..

This week went by so quickly. Covered a couple of labs on OSPF, redistribution, distribution list, prefix-list, route-mapping etc. It was nice of our Cisco teacher to lend me the ccnp switch and tshoot lab manuals though I really dont want to have anything to do with them. I just dont want to distract myself with unnecessary stuff while i am studying for ccnp route. 

I purchased the chris bryant ccnp crash course. For 99USD you get unlimited access to the course for a lifetime. I downloaded the CCNP Route mp3 so I can get to listen to him while driving. So now I have the following study materials:

• CBT Nuggets CCNP Route training videos by Jeremy Cioara
• CCNP Route training videos by Chris Bryant
• Cisco Official CCNP Route Study Guide
• Cisco CCNP Route Lab Manual
• Digitaltut.com

I haven’t attempted any practice exam since there’s just so much more things to cover. Just starting on BGP but going through different training materials all at the same time, each one has a different order/approach on teaching the subject. I have scheduled my exam on the 14th of January 2014. Would have wanted it somewhere in the 4th week of that month but limited slot are available. Everything is fully book for all Brisbane and Gold Coast testing centers so far until October. I can’t wait that long. 

I am playing with the idea of not pursuing Diploma next semester. The way i see it, I am not really learning a whoe lot in school. Most of what I know now are from self started training. If there’s one reason to continue on next sem, it would be because of being in a learning environment and having someone to ask if I am stuck on a topic (assuming someone knows the answer)…

I have finally booked my CCNP route exam to Jan 15, 2014. How time flies, 2013 seemed like a short year. The exam will be at the city at 12:30nn. For some reason booking for exam around that time has been tough. Even the one at the Gold Coast has all the schedule for January all filled out until March. I can’t take CCNP after March that’s way too far and knowing myself I might just be tempted to studying or do something else. Might as well go straight to CCNP while CCNA is still fresh. 

So far I am done with OSPF labs, I haven’t mastered all the commands but I think I have a fair understanding of the core commands. Mykel, one of the tutors in school showed me the new lab manuals for CCNP published 2010. My lab was published a couple of years before that so I am playing with the idea of getting a copy. 

Moving on to Redistribution….now with a date on the exam…Its really official I am taking my first CCNP exam….here we go…again…

It’s a long weekend ahead and today’s been spent going to Mooloolooba, not sure if I spelled that correctly to be out in the beach and drove afterwards to Sunny bank and go to a salon. I was able to catch a couple of CBTNuggets video on Redistribution and BGP. Oh man, this is so not CCNA level anymore. The CBT videos are only 15 hours long but it feels like going through all the CCNA ICDN1 and 2 videos combined. 

You get to learn new terms like tag, match, map etc new stuff that I don’t remember encountering in the CCNA level studies. It has been 10days since I passed the exam and it took me 2 months to do some hard core studying. With this one, I definitely need to go back to school and be surrounded by people to help me out. I have been doing labs via GNS3, only issue with GNS3 is that its acting up on frame relay sims. 

I’m too sleepy to even finish half of this video on BGP CBTNuggets. It’s been a long day. 

I needed a break from all these review. As one my classmates has said, I have been caining it. I was able to make my GNS3 up and running with most of the routers ios available. I get distracted once in a while whenever a thought of getting more into ipv6 or this or that. I have to convince myself to stay focused specially now I have no body to take this exam with. No more study group of students together taking an exam. 

I must say, passing CCNA was a morale booster for me. I have never studied this hard before and everything just paid off. 

I’m studying OSPF and its complexities. Some of the stuff here i’ve already encountered during my CCNA reviews only in a deeper and more real world scenario kinda feel. It makes more sense since CCNP are expected to be taken by network engineers.