Cisco Certification Central

Cisco CCNA Certification On A Shoestring Can It Be Done

The answer is a resounding YES!...and this article shows you how. For years, many would-be networking professionals have been put off by the thought of expensive and time-consuming courses, not having access to good quality teachers and mentors and, very importantly, not having access to a practice lab.

Well, the industry's very open secret is that there are scores of networking professionals delivering a very high standard of service who are primarily self-taught. While it is true that the advantages of instructor-led courses and live practice labs for a would-be certification candidate are obvious, taking the self-study route does have quite a few of its own advantages, a couple of them being you can work at your own pace, and can save a fair amount of money.

The biggest source of free and inexpensive resources is of course the Internet, which is heaving with information for the certification candidate. This is one area I've found where the "you get what you pay for" rule just does not apply. A lot of the information is very well written, accurate...and free! There's information for beginners, articles for "gurus", exam tips, lab practice material?quite literally everything you need to prepare for and pass your exam.

Let us start with what total beginners can expect. There are scores of people looking to embark on a career in networking, sometimes making a complete start from years working in a totally different field. People falling in this group are particularly at a disadvantage because of how little they know to start with. If this describes you, I have some very good news. A quick search on the Internet for articles and tutorials on basics such as OSI model, IP, routing, Internet and networking will yield a wealth of information. For example, a particularly excellent site for beginners is the computer channel of the very popular "HowStuffWorks" site, whileWebopedia would be a good place for getting to grips with computing terminology and acronyms. Many sites will have free demos, articles, forums and discussion groups that will help a computing novice start to get a feel for the field.

Full List of Articles