Passing The CCNA and CCNP Exams: Setup Mode

CCNA and CCNP candidates need to know all about Setup Mode, why a router goes into that mode, and as you'll see, how to get out of that mode. Practicing Setup Mode at work is a good way to get fired, though, so you need to practice this on your CCNA / CCNP home lab or rack rental. In this article, we'll take a look at a Cisco 2500 router going into setup mode and a few tips that will help you pass the exams and excel at your job.

First, why does a router go into Setup Mode in the first place? When a Cisco router boots up, the router looks into Non-Volatile RAM (NVRAM) for the startup configuration file. If such a file is not found, and the router has not been programmed to look to a TFTP server for this file, the router enters setup mode.

The most common reason for a router not to have a startup configuration file is that the file's been erased. We will now erase this file on our 2500 router. As you'll see, the Cisco router warns us about erasing NVRAM and makes us confirm this choice, which it acknowledges with the OK message.

R1#write erase

Erasing the nvram filesystem will remove all files! Continue? [confirm]

[OK]

Erase of nvram: complete

R1#

The router will now be reloaded. There is a slightly misleading message displayed during reboot:

R1#reload

Proceed with reload? [confirm]

00:15:21: %SYS-5-RELOAD: Reload requested

System Bootstrap, Version 11.0(10c)XB1, PLATFORM SPECIFIC RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc1)

Copyright (c) 1986-1997 by cisco Systems

2500 processor with 14336 Kbytes of main memory

Notice: NVRAM invalid, possibly due to write erase.

That notice doesn't mean the NVRAM is corrupt or unusable; this message means the NVRAM doesn't have a startup configuration file.

The router will continue to boot and finally present you with this prompt:


--- System Configuration Dialog ---

Would you like to enter the initial configuration dialog? [yes/no]:

Almost every WAN engineer I know answers "no" to this question, because Setup Mode is a long, clumsy way to set up a router (in my humble opinion). We will answer "yes" in order to see this mode in action.


--- System Configuration Dialog ---

Would you like to enter the initial configuration dialog? [yes/no]: y

At any point you may enter a question mark '?' for help.

Use ctrl-c to abort configuration dialog at any prompt.

Default settings are in square brackets '[]'.

Basic management setup configures only enough connectivity
for management of the system, extended setup will ask you
to configure each interface on the system

Would you like to enter basic management setup? [yes/no]: y

Configuring global parameters:

Enter host name [Router]: R1

The enable secret is a password used to protect access to

privileged EXEC and configuration modes. This password, after

entered, becomes encrypted in the configuration.

Enter enable secret:

% No defaulting allowed

Enter enable secret:

Already, there's something about Setup Mode that you might not like. This mode forces you to set an enable password and an enable secret password. As you continue in this mode, you'll see this mode ask you questions about every single interface on the router, even if you're not planning to use that interface. Using Setup Mode really does get quite old after a while, again in my opinion.

One of the most important things about Setup Mode is knowing how to get out of it without saving the configuration. One way is at the very end of this mode, where you can answer "no" to "Do you want to save this configuration?" I personally never make it that far! Instead of waiting until the end of Setup Mode, we can use the CTRL-C key combination to abort this mode and ignore the changes.

Configuration aborted, no changes made.


Press RETURN to get started!

Setup Mode is not a mode that CCNA and CCNP candidates get a great deal of practice with, but you will be tested on your knowledge about it both in the exam room and on the job. And once you start configuring a router with this mode, you'll be glad you know how to get out of it!

Passing Cisco's CCNA and CCNP Exams: Five Tips For Exam Day Success

As you get ready to pass the CCNA or CCNP exams, you can feel quite a bit of stress as you enter your last week of study. Let's take a look at a few ways to reduce that stress.

1. Do not stay up late cramming. The CCNA and CCNP are not exams you're going to pass by cramming. "Cramming" is a study technique best left behind in junior high school. The CCNA can't be passed by memorization - you've got to know how Cisco technologies work. That leads us to the second point...

2. Get lots of rest. By far, this is the most overlooked factor on exam day. The CCNA and CCNP exams are going to demand your best. You're going to be performing subnetting, binary and hex conversions, analyzing network diagrams for troubleshooting, and much more. You've got to be mentally sharp. You can add 100 points to your exam score just by showing up well-rested. And let's be realistic - if you don't know something at 11 PM the night before your exam, you're not going to learn it overnight. Get some sleep!

3. Get everything together the night before the exam. You don't want to be running around the house the morning of the exam looking for your keys. Make sure you have your keys and your ID the night before the exam.

4. Know where the testing center is. If you've never been to the center you'll be passing the CCNA in before, go there before the morning of the exam. Do not rely on Mapquest or a friend's directions. You don't want to be late for your exam.

5. Allow for traffic. Many CCNA and CCNP candidates prefer to take their exams in the morning. Again, if you haven't been to the exam center before, you should drive there during morning rush hour traffic before your exam date to make sure you have enough time to get there. You don't want to be sitting in traffic when you should be sitting in the exam room!

How To Become a Cisco CCNP

Congratulations on your decision to earn your CCNP certification! As a CCIE, I can tell you that Cisco certifications are both financially and personally rewarding.

To earn your CCNP, you first have to earn your CCNA certification. Then you're faced with a decision - take the three-exam CCNP path, or the four-exam path? They're both quite demanding, so let's take a look at each path.

The four-exam CCNP path includes the Building Scalable Cisco Internetworks exam (BSCI), Building Cisco Multilayer Switched Networks exam (BCMSN), Building Cisco Remote Access Networks (BCRAN), and Cisco Internetwork Troubleshooting (CIT) exam.

The three-exam path combines the BSCI and BCMSN exams into a single exam, called the Composite exam.

I'm often asked what order I recommend taking the exams in. After earning your CCNA, I recommend you begin studying for the BSCI exam immediately. You will find the fundamentals you learned in your CCNA studies will help you a great deal with this exam. You're going to add to your CCNA knowledgebase quite a bit when it comes to OSPF and EIGRP, as well as being introduced to BGP.

I don't have a preference between the BCMSN and BCRAN exams, but I do recommend you take the CIT exam last. You'll be using all the skills you learned in the first three exams to pass the CIT. It's a very demanding exam, and it's a little hard to troubleshoot technologies that you haven't learned yet!

The CCNP is both financially and personally fulfilling. Once you complete your CCNA studies, take a little breather and then get started on your CCNP studies. The more you know, the more valuable you are in today's ever-changing IT job market.

Four Important Commands For Your CCNA / CCNP Home Lab

More CCNA and CCNP candidates than ever before are putting together their own home practice labs. It's more affordable than it ever has been, and I receive emails daily from new CCNAs and CCNPs who say it's the best thing they could have done to improve their studies.

There are some commands you can configure on your lab routers that won't necessarily be on your CCNA or CCNP exams, but they will make life a lot easier for you. Let's take a look at just a few of these.

The command "no exec" is short, yet powerful. Occasionally you'll have what is referred to as a "rogue EXEC" process tie up a line, and you end up having to continually clear lines, which disrupts your practice. If you have an access server, I highly recommend you configure this command on your lines, as shown here:

ACCESS_SERVER(con)#line 1 8

ACCESS_SERVER(con)#no exec

From your CCNA studies, you know that the command "no ip domain-lookup" prevents a Cisco router from sending a broadcast to find a DNS server anytime you enter something that is not an IOS command - and that includes mistyped commands, which happens to all of us sooner or later. Make sure to run that command in global configuration mode on all your practice routers.

There are two commands I like to configure on the console line on all my practice routers and switches. The first is "exec-timeout 0 0", which prevents you from being kicked out of enable mode and back into user exec after a few minutes of inactivity. (This doesn't sound like much, but you'll get pretty tired of typing "enable" after a while.) The first zero refers to minutes, the second zero to seconds. Setting them both to zero disables the exec-timeout function.

The second command prevents the router from interrupting the command you're typing with a console message. If you've ever been in the middle of typing a router command and suddenly you're interrupted with a logging message, you know that can be pretty annoying. We don't want the router to not display the message, but we do want the router to wait until we're done entering data. The command to perform this is "logging synchronous".

R1(config)#line console 0

R1(config-line)#exec-timeout 0 0

R1(config-line)#logging synchronous

You won't see many of these commands on your exams, but after you configure them on your home lab devices, you'll wonder how you did without them!

Computer Certification: Become A Utility Player

In baseball, a "utility player" is one who plays more than one position. These players are usually backups, but they have a job in the major leagues because of their value to the team; since they can play more than one position, they have that much more value to their employer.

Too often in IT, workers become either LAN or WAN engineers, knowing little if anything about the other side. Many LAN administrators I worked with knew little about routing and switching, while many WAN engineers I knew not only didn't know much about the LAN side of their network, but they didn't want to know anything about the servers!

In today's IT world, it's a bad idea to specialize in only one thing and not know how to do anything else. Not only does it limit your future career prospects, but it limits your current prospects as well. Employers don't want to hire someone and have them get up to speed on the job - they want someone who can walk right in and do the job. The more you know, the better your chance of getting a better job - or quickly being able to get another job if you were laid off tomorrow.

A term often heard on Wall Street is "diversification", meaning that investors should not invest heavily or totally in only one stock; if that stock plummets, they're in big trouble. Your career is the most important stock you will ever own, and you're 100% in charge of it. Diversify. If you're working primarily with servers, learn some routing and switching. If you know the routing protocols your company uses on its WAN, learn something about that protocol. (If you don't know the protocol, ask!)

While you’re adding these skills, get certified while you’re at it! Adding a CCNA, MCSE, or other computer certification looks great on your resume while signaling to employers that you’re constantly adding to your skills.

Adding more skills and knowledge to your IT skill set is always a good idea. Don't limit yourself to the technologies you work with every day. Make an investment in yourself and become a well-rounded network engineer. This will help you keep the job you have - and open doors in the future that might otherwise have remained closed.

Cisco Certification: Recertifying Your CCNA and CCNP

Once you get your CCNA and CCNP, you can't just rest on your accomplishment. You've got to continue to study and add to your skill set - and then prove to Cisco you've been doing just that by recertifying.

Recertification sounds like a pain, but it's actually one of the best things to ever happen to computer certification, and it helps your career as well. One trap many LAN and WAN personnel fall into is that they fail to keep up with changes in technology, and if they happen to be laid off or want to change jobs, they're unable to because they didn't keep their skill set up.

Cisco's recertification policies ensure that if you want to keep your CCNA, CCNP, or one of the other valuable Cisco certifications, you've got to take a recertification exam.

As of November 2005, to recertify as a CCNA, you need to pass either the current CCNA exam, ICND exam, or any 642 professional level or Cisco Qualified Specialist exam. (This does not include Sales Specialist exams.) Passing a CCIE written qualification exam also recertifies you as a CCNA. CCNAs are valid for three years.

For the CCNP, you need to pass the 642-891 Composite exam, a CCIE written qualification exam, or BOTH the BSCI and BCMSN exams (642-801 and 642-811, respectively.) CCNP certifications are valid for three years.

As you can see, you've got quite a few options either way. The one classic mistake you must not make is waiting too long to begin preparing for the exams, and give yourself a little leeway just in case you don't recertify the first time around. Once the deadline passes, your certification is gone, and in the case of the CCNP that means taking all the exams again.

As a professional, it's your responsibility to keep up with changes in the Cisco certification world, and this includes changes in the recertification program. Make a point of visiting the "Learning And Events" section of Cisco's website regularly to look for changes in the certification program. And while you're there, you just might see another cert that catches your eye!

Cisco CCNP Certification FAQ

To earn your CCNP, you've got to pass some very rigorous Cisco exams, and you also need to know the rules regarding this important certification. In this article, I'll answer some of the most commonly asked questions regarding the CCNP.

Q: What exams do I need to pass to get my CCNP?

A: You have two options, a three-exam path and a four-exam path. Currently, the four-exam path consists of rigorous exams on advanced routing techniques (BSCI), advanced switching (BCMSN), remote access methods (BCRAN), and advanced troubleshooting techniques (CIT). The three-exam path combines the BCMSN and BSCI exams into a single exam, the Composite exam.

Q: Do I have to take them in any order?

A: No, the order is up to the candidate. Most CCNP candidates take the BSCI exam first and the CIT exam last, but again this is up to the candidate.

Q: What else do I have to do to get the CCNP?

A: You must earn your CCNA before you can be CCNP certified (as well as passing the exams, of course).

Q: Is there a recertification requirement?

A: Cisco CCNP certifications are valid for three years. During that time, you must either pass the Composite exam, the BSCI and BCMSN exams, or pass any CCIE written exam.

Q: What if I don't recertify within the three-year period?

A: You must then meet whatever CCNP requirements there are at that time, from the beginning. It's easier to make sure you recertify!

Becoming CCNP certified is a great boost to your career and your confidence, and as with any Cisco certification, it's up to you to stay current with the CCNA and CCNP requirements. Visit the Career Certification section of Cisco's website regularly to learn about the program's requirements and changes.

Cisco CCNP Certification: Using The BGP Command “Update-Source”

When you start preparing for your CCNP exam, particularly the BSCI exam, you're introduced to Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) configurations. BGP is unlike any protocol you learned during your CCNA studies, and even the similarities are a little bit different!

BGP forms neighbor relationships, much like EIGRP and OSPF do. The interesting thing with BGP is that potential neighbors, or "peers", do not need to be directly connected and can use their loopback interfaces to form the peer relationships.

It may well be to your advantage to use loopbacks to form peer relationships rather than the actual interface facing the potential neighbor. This can be done because BGP uses static neighbor statements rather than any kind of dynamic neighbor discovery process.

Consider a router that has two paths to a BGP speaker. The interfaces are numbered like this:

Router1: Serial0, 172.1.1.1 /24, Serial2, 179.1.1.1 /24, loopback0, 1.1.1.1 /32.

Router2: Serial0, 172.1.1.2/24, Serial2 179.1.1.2/24, loopback0, 2.2.2.2 /32.

We could configure Router1 like this:

router bgp 200

neighbor 172.1.1.2 remote-as 200

In this case, BGP would automatically use 172.1.1.1 as the source for the TCP connection that has to be set up with the neighbor before updates can be exchanged; this address is known as the best local address. However, if the remote peer's serial0 interface is shut down or goes down for another reason, the peer relationship would be lost even though Router2 is still available.

Instead of using one of the physical interfaces, we can use the loopbacks on each router to establish the TCP-based peer connection. The configurations would look like this:

Router1:

router bgp 200

neighbor 2.2.2.2 remote-as 200

neighbor 2.2.2.2 update-source loopback0

Router2:

router bgp 200

neighbor 1.1.1.1 remote-as 200

neighbor 1.1.1.1 update-source loopback0

In this case, losing one of the physical connections does not necessarily mean the BGP peering is lost; as long as the routers have a valid path to each other's loopback addresses, the BGP peer relationship will stay in place. And better yet, we avoid the dreaded “single point of failure

Cisco CCNA Certification: How And Why Switches Trunk

Your CCNA studies are going to include quite a bit of information about switches, and for good reason. if you don't understand basic switching theory, you can't configure and troubleshoot Cisco switches, either on the CCNA exam or in the real world. That goes double for trunking!

Trunking is simply enabling two or more switches to communicate and send frames to each other for transmission to remote hosts. There are two major trunking protocols that we need to know the details of for exam success and real-world success, but before we get to the protocols, let's discuss the cables we need.

Connecting two Cisco switches requires a crossover cable. As you know, there are eight wires inside an ethernet cable. In a crossover cable, four of the cables "cross over" from one pin to another. For many newer Cisco switches, all you need to do to create a trunk is connect the switches with a crossover cable. For instance, 2950 switches dynamically trunk once you connect them with the right cable. If you use the wrong cable, you'll be there a while!

There are two different trunking protocols in use on today's Cisco switches, ISL and IEEE 802.1Q, generally referred to as "dot1q". There are three main differences between the two. First, ISL is a Cisco-proprietary trunking protocol, where dot1q is the industry standard. (Those of you new to Cisco testing should get used to the phrases "Cisco-proprietary" and "industry standard".) If you're working in a multivendor environment, ISL may not be a good choice. And even though ISL is Cisco's own trunking protocol, some Cisco switches run only dot1q.

ISL also encapsulates the entire frame, increasing the network overhead. Dot1q only places a header on the frame, and in some circumstances, doesn't even do that. There is much less overhead with dot1q as compared to ISL. That leads to the third major difference, the way the protocols work with the native vlan.

The native vlan is simply the default vlan that switch ports are placed into if they are not expressly placed into another vlan. On Cisco switches, the native vlan is vlan 1. (This can be changed.) If dot1q is running, frames that are going to be sent across the trunk line don't even have a header placed on them; the remote switch will assume that any frame that has no header is destined for the native vlan.

The problem with ISL is that is doesn't understand what a native vlan is. Every single frame will be encapsulated, regardless of the vlan it's destined for.

Switching theory is a big part of your CCNA studies, and it can seem overwhelming at first. Just break your studies down into smaller, more manageable parts, and soon you'll see the magic letters "CCNA" behind your name!

Cisco CCNA / CCNP Home Labs: Developing Troubleshooting Skills

CCNA / CCNP candidates are going to be drilled by Cisco when it comes to troubleshooting questions. You're going to have to be able to analyze configurations to see what the problem is (and if there is a problem in the first place), determine the meaning of different debug outputs, and show the ability not just to configure a router or switch, but troubleshoot one.

That's just as it should be, because CCNAs and CCNPs will find themselves doing a lot of troubleshooting in their careers. Troubleshooting isn't something that can just be learned from a book; you've got to have some experience working with routers and switches. The only real way to learn how to troubleshoot is to develop that ability while working on live equipment.

Of course, your company or client is going to take a very dim view of you developing this skill on their live network. So what can you do?

Assemble a Cisco home lab. When you start working with real Cisco equipment, you're doing yourself a lot of favors. First, you're going to be amazed at how well you retain information that will become second nature to you before exam day. But more importantly, both for the exam room and your career, you're developing invaluable troubleshooting skills.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying knowing the theory of how routers and switches work is unimportant. Quite the opposite - if you don't know networking theory, you're not going to become a CCNA or CCNP. But the ability to apply that knowledge is vital - and the only way you can get that is to work on real Cisco routers and switches. As for these "router simulators" on the market today, ask yourself this simple question: "When I walk into a server room, how many router simulators do I see?"

I often tell students that they'll do their best learning when they screw something up. I've had many a student tell me later that I was right - when they misconfigured frame relay, ISDN, or another CCNA / CCNP technology and then had to fix it themselves, it not only gave them the opportunity to apply their knowledge, but it gave them the confidence to know they could do it.

And you can't put a price on confidence - in the exam room or in the network center!

Cisco CCNA / CCNP Certification Exam: Troubleshooting Direct Serial Connections

A prime topic of your CCNA and CCNP CIT exams will be connecting Cisco routers directly via their Serial interfaces, and while the configuration is straightforward, there are some vital details and show commands you must know in order to pass the exams and configure this successfully in production and home lab networks. Let's take a look at a sample configuration.

Connecting Cisco routers directly via their Serial interfaces works really well once you get it running - and getting such a connection up and running is easy enough. You can use show controller serial x to find out which endpoint is acting as the DCE, and it's the DCE that must be configured with the clockrate command.

R3#show controller serial 1

HD unit 1, idb = 0x11B4DC, driver structure at 0x121868

buffer size 1524 HD unit 1, V.35 DCE cable

R3(config)#int serial1

R3(config-if)#ip address 172.12.13.3 255.255.255.0

R3(config-if)#clockrate 56000

R3(config-if)#no shut

Failure to configure the clockrate has some interesting effects regarding the physical and logical state of the interfaces. Let's remove the clockrate from R3 and see what happens.

R3(config)#int s1

R3(config-if)#no clockrate 56000

R3(config-if)#

18:02:19: %LINEPROTO-5-UPDOWN: Line protocol on Interface Serial1, changed state to down

The line protocol doesn't drop immediately, but it does drop. Let's run show interface serial1 to compare the physical and logical interface states.

R3#show int serial1

Serial1 is up, line protocol is down

Physically, the interface is fine, so the physical interface is up. It's only the logical part of the interface - the line protocol - that is down. It's the same situation on R1.

R1#show inter serial1

Serial1 is up, line protocol is down

While a router misconfiguration is the most likely cause of a serial connection issue, that's not the only reason for clocking issues. Cisco's website documentation mentions CSU/DSU misconfiguration, out-of-spec cables, bad patch panel connections, and connecting too many cables together as other reasons for clocking problems. Still, the number one reason for clocking problems in my experience is simply forgetting to configure the clockrate command!

Cisco CCNA / CCNP Certification: Introduction To BGP Attributes

BGP is one of the most complex topics you'll study when pursuing your CCNP, if not the most complex. I know from personal experience that when I was earning my CCNP, BGP is the topic that gave me the most trouble at first. One thing I keep reminding today's CCNP candidates about, though, is that no Cisco technology is impossible to understand if you just break it down and understand the basics before you start trying to understand the more complex configurations.

BGP attributes are one such topic. You've got well-known mandatory, well-known discretionary, transitive, and non-transitive. Then you've got each individual BGP attribute to remember, and the order in which BGP considers attributes, and what attributes even are... and a lot more! As with any other Cisco topic, we have to walk before we can run. Let's take a look at what attributes are and what they do in BGP.

BGP attributes are much like what metrics are to OSPF, RIP, IGRP, and EIGRP. You won't see them listed in a routing table, but attributes are what BGP considers when choosing the best path to a destination when multiple valid (loop-free) paths exist.

When BGP has to decide between such paths, there is an order in which BGP considers the path attributes. For success on the CCNP exams, you need to know this order. BGP looks at path attributes in this order:

Highest weight (Cisco-proprietary BGP value)

Highest local preference (LOCAL_PREF)

Prefer locally originated route.

Shortest AS_PATH is preferred.

Choose route with lowest origin code. Internal paths are preferred over external paths, and external paths are preferred over paths with an origin of "incomplete".
Lowest multi-exit discriminator (MED)

External BGP routes preferred over Internal BGP routes.

If no external route, select path with lowest IGP cost to the next-hop router for iBGP.

Choose most recent route.

Choose lowest BGP RID (Router ID).

If you don't know what these values are, or how they're configured, don't panic! The next several parts of this BGP tutorial will explain it all. So spend some time studying this order, and in part II of this free BGP tutorial, we'll look at each of these values in detail. Keep studying!