Well, my month at Network World’s Cisco Subnet is coming to an end. To wrap up my CCNA “prep central,” I’d like to walk you through how I personally prepare for any Cisco exam. I noticed that Wendell Odom was just talking about this, so I’ll try not to duplicate his work. Here’s the process I go through:

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Ethics - set of moral principles: a theory or system of moral values (Websters).

Throwing out the term “Ethical practice exam” is easy to do…but what does it mean? Here’s how I define it:

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After you've discovered GNS3 (aka Dynamips...aka Dynagen), you now have a real, emulated environment...ehhh...strike that...you now have a "quasi-real" emulated Cisco environment to add routers without cost. You can practice and test nearly any configuration you'd like...but now we come to a big problem...

WHAT DO YOU PRACTICE?

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While we're talking about building a home lab, let's talk about the cheapest home lab ever...That'd be FREE. A group of guys from France have put together a Cisco emulator known as GNS3. Notice I said, "emulator" rather than "simulator". This is the real deal guys...put together a network diagram and boot a REAL IOS in a PC-based lab environment.

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A couple years ago, my wife and I went to purchase a new car. We had a budgeted amount we were looking to spend...but spent way more. Why? Cool features. I can't turn them down. Alloy wheels? Just $850 more...Integrated GPS? $1200...never get lost again for just a dollar a day!?! (what a sales guy)

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$20 - $30 to build a home lab where you can perform most everything tested on the CCNA. I’m not kidding!

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It took me about 5 hours to do…but it was worth every minute. I’ve finally created a network diagram…of my house. Seriously. Every room is broken into its own, routed VLAN. Internet connectivity can be achieved through two, redundant exit points: a Cisco 2801 router or an ASA 5505. Wireless connectivity can be found on three different SSIDs: one that gives access to my entire home network, another that gives access to just the Internet (for those in my neighborhood fortunate enough to live by me), and one that’s dedicated to my Nintendo Wii.

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Hilarious…I just Googled for “pass CCNA” to find what was already out there on tips to pass the CCNA. The first hit was “How to pass CCNA: 6 Steps to Success.” The second hit then bragged, “How to pass Cisco CCNA exam in 3 easy steps.” It reminds me of the exercise videos that say “Great abs in 10 minutes a day” right next to the “7 minute abs” selection. So, I clicked on the 3 step process to see what advice was being given… Step #2 advised to “Buy a TestKing exam.”

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Well, hello! My name is Jeremy Cioara; welcome to my corner of Network World's Cisco Subnet for the month of May! Before I get to blogging, I'd like to give you a brief introduction, then talk about my purpose here.

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