Cisco CCNP Certification Library is a complete test preparation package for all four exams required for CCNP certification. This bundle contains the following four books: CCNP Routing Exam Certification Guide, CCNP Switching Exam Certification Guide, CCNP Remote Access Exam Certification Guide, and CCNP Support Exam Certification Guide. These four Certification Guides combine to give CCNP candidates the only officially developed review and practice tools for comprehensive self-study. Covers -- all the key topics for routing, switching, remote access, and troubleshooting, several unique features of these books help CCNP candidates maximize their retention and recall of subject matter at exam time and at their daily job. Over 200 practice questions on the companion CD-ROMs lets readers take sample exams that simulate the real testing environment. This customizable software lets users decide how they want to practice or take a full practice exam.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
The Cisco CCNP Certification Library is a set of four technically-correct books written as course materials. They all have the same strengths and weaknesses: they're technologically accurate and make passing the exam a no-brainer, but the dense, no-frills nature of the writing means that every sentence must be read thoroughly and completely to guarantee your CCNP.
First of all, the good points: By and large, these books are highly accurate and reasonably error-free, which is not at all surprising, since these are official course guides straight from Cisco's mouth. They get their facts across directly and succinctly, and are unlike most other certification books in that they're all deeply concerned with teaching you how to do your job properly. They're packed with on-the-job examples, and the experience shines through when it comes to teaching you the important bits, for not only do they show you the "how" and the "why," but quite often they also show you the "where"--how each technology and protocol fits into the larger picture.
The writing, unfortunately, is much the same from book to book--they're all extremely textbooky, as if each book was written by Joe Friday from Dragnet. There isn't a wasted sentence to be found here; every word counts, making the information-to-text ratio higher than almost any other certification book you're likely to find on the market. Skim a page of a topic that you think you already know, and you may miss two or three important smaller points that become quite important in later chapters. If you're used to chattier books like Sybex or Macmillan, the lack of handholding can be abrupt and startling.
The information density and real-world experience comes at a cost: Although the end goal of every test-taker is ultimately to put that experience to work on a live system, every CCNP wannabe has to get over the hurdle of taking the exam--and none of the books are true exam practice. Admittedly, each of them gives you tons of useful knowledge, but there are a lot of meanderings where they go into detail on something that never gets tested. Furthermore, they don't tell you that these are rarely-tested topics, so you may spend a lot of time struggling with some abstract concept that never comes up on the exam, and ignoring a subject that almost always is on the exam.
Moreover, the questions at the end of each chapter are essay-style, not multiple-choice. Cisco has made it quite clear what their teaching objectives are: If you know the material well enough, says Cisco, you don't need us to tell you what's on the exam--you'll know. As such, each book has to be read and thoroughly understood in its entirety in order to guarantee a passing score. This means that if you're willing to devote the time and effort, you'll pass without a hitch--exam slackers can look elsewhere.
The books themselves are remarkably consistent, and pleasantly free from the "two good books and a crappy one" syndrome so common in large, expensive boxed sets. Each book pulls its own weight, although the CCNP Routing Guide--even though it's the thickest and deals with some of the toughest concepts--is probably the weakest in the set, since some of the writing is obtuse even by Cisco's standards and may confuse those not intimately familiar with routing concepts. On the other hand, the CCNP Support guide is sterling by anyone's standards and is even a useful read for non-CCNP candidates, as it hands out real-world troubleshooting advice by the barrelful.
In short, this set isn't an easy read--not even close. It isn't for those who barely passed their CCNA or people who don't routinely work with networks. But it is astoundingly comprehensive and error-free by certification guide standards, and the effort you put into grinding through here will be richly rewarded by a high passing score and a good foundation of CCNP concepts that will set you up for an excellent job--and perhaps even your CCIE. Highly recommended. --William Steinmetz
From the Back Cover
Review and practice for the CCNP exams with the official Cisco Exam Certification Guides
Coverage of all four CCNP exams enables you to identify and fill your knowledge gaps before the exam date.
>li>CCNP Routing Exam Certification Guide coverage includes: managing scalable network growth, IP addressing, IP routing, OSPF, EIGRP, implementing and tuning BGP, and controlling routing updates.
* CCNP Switching Exam Certification Guide coverage includes: campus network design, switch connectivity, defining common workgroups, trunking with ATM LANE, interVLAN routing, multilayer switching, HSRP, multicast networks, controlling access, and troubleshooting campus networks.
* CCNP Remote Access Exam Certification Guide coverage includes: assembling and cabling WAN components, configuring asynchronous connections with modems, configuring PPP and controlling network access, using ISDN and DDR, configuring Cisco 700 series routers, establishing X.25 connections, managing Frame Relay connections and network performance, scaling IP address with NAT and access control with AAA, and a VPN overview.
* CCNP Support Exam Certification Guide coverage includes: support resources, troubleshooting methods, identifying targets, Cisco troubleshooting tools, troubleshooting VLANs, and diagnosing and correcting campus TCP/IP, Novell networking, AppleTalk(r), Cisco Catalyst(r), Frame Relay, and ISDN BRI problems.
Cisco CCNP Certification Library is a comprehensive review and practice package for the four Cisco Certified Network Professional (CCNP) exams: BSCI exam, Switching Exam, Remote Access Exam, and Support Exam. The four books contained in this package, CCNP Routing Exam Certification Guide, CCNP Switching Exam Certification Guide, CCNP Remote Access Exam Certification Guide, and CCNP Support Exam Certification Guide, present complete reviews and ample opportunity to test your knowledge of CCNP exam topics. These authorized Cisco CCNP study guides are written by CCIE(r) certified individuals and certified Cisco Systems instructors, bringing years of teaching and consulting experience together in an ideal test preparation format.
CCNP Routing Exam Certification Guide helps you evaluate your ability to build, manage, and optimize scalable, routed Cisco internetworks. This book covers all the topics on the CCNP BSCI exam #640-901, except for IS-IS. A free download of an IS-IS supplement is available on the Cisco Press website that will make coverage of the BSCI exam topics complete. To download the IS-IS supplement, go to ciscopress/ccnp. CCNP Switching Exam Certification Guide helps you understand how to build campus networks using multilayer switching technologies and to manage campus network traffic. CCNP Remote Access Exam Certification Guide tests your ability to build remote access networks to interconnect central sites to branch offices and home offices, control access to the central site, and maximize bandwidth utilization over remote links. CCNP Support Exam Certification Guide examines your ability to diagnose, isolate, and correct network failures and performance problems.
Every chapter in each Cisco Press Exam Certification Guide focuses your study and tests your knowledge of the subject through specially designed assessment features. "Do I Know This Already?" quizzes assess your knowledge and help you decide how much time you need to spend on each section. The detailed Foundation Topics sections review the exam topics you will need to master. Each chapter includes a Foundation Summary section full of tables and concise reviews for quick reference. Challenging chapter-ending review questions and scenario-based exercises test your knowledge of the subject matter, reinforce key concepts, and ensure that you understand how all the technologies work together in a real-world environment. Finally, each book's companion CD-ROM has a robust, customizable test engine that allows you to take practice exams that mimic the real testing environment. You can take a full sample exam, focus on particular topic areas, randomize answers for reusability, track your progress, examine your strengths and weaknesses, and refer to an electronic version of the book to review concepts.
CCNP Certification Library is part of a recommended learning path from Cisco Systems that can include simulation and hands-on training from authorized Cisco Learning Partners and self-study products from Cisco Press. To find out more about instructor-led, e-learning, and hands-on instruction offered by authorized Cisco Learning Partners, please visit cisco/go/authorizedtraining.
Companion CD-ROMs
The four companion CD-ROMs contain test banks with a total of more than 800 practice questions.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Good books but ....,
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Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Cisco CCNP Certification Library (4 Book Box Set) (Paperback)
I bought this set of books to refresh my memory, compare it against my experience and to see in which area I have to study to be able to pass the tests for CCNP. Overall I would normaly rate them higher, but all 4 books need extensive editing. I found many errors, even in areas I didn't have that much experience. More then once I would read something on one page and then on the next page it would opposite of what was just said. Very often the examples are wrong too. In the Routing book for example it talks about static routes and using passive-interface on a BRI interface, yet the example shows in the top BRI as physical interface, but the bottom of the example and the text after the example talks about Serial 0.The same goes for the included test software with study mode and test exam. There are many questions for which you should select more then one answer, but they set the answers to only one selectable. Or in one case at least the question had two possible answer choices, but none was marked as the right answer. I sent several times feedback to Cisco Press and checked their website if they have maybe an update for the books or software, but nothing so far. Nor has any of my feedbacks being answered. All in all the books did help me to prepare myself for the tests and pass all successfull on the first try, but I credit much to my general knowledge about networking and parallel reading other documentation...
15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
One Stop Shop for CCNP Study!,
By Jayson "jato" (Kansas City, MO) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Cisco CCNP Certification Library (4 Book Box Set) (Paperback)
This box set is really the only thing you need to purchase for CCNP certification. I'd read these books over Sybex's every day of the week and twice on Sunday. **Note: I really DID read these books all week, and then would read straight through twice on Sunday!!** Yes, this book has errors, they all do. Check the publisher's site for errata. Although at times they can be very dry, technical, and perhaps convey more information then needed on certain topics, more is certainly preferable to less. I really like the essay questions at the beginning and end of the chapter, they make sure you *know* the material covered and the exam objectives. If nothing else, purchase this set for the 200+ question quiz engine contained in each of the 4 books. Unlike Sybex's, these AREN'T the questions in the book. If you score well on the multiple choice flashcard program, it's exam time. Jayson Tobias
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Too many errors , and no effort to correct them,
By Stephen Martin (Hayward, CA United States) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Cisco CCNP Certification Library (4 Book Box Set) (Paperback)
I think this is the first book I've ever seen where the author's name is misspelled on the cover - the Routing book spells it "Claire" Gough, but all the other references are to "Clare". That's not really substantive, but it's indicative of the kind of problems in the text. I just passed the routing exam today, but I spent more study time than I wanted to trying to figure out how things really worked, and which parts of the book were right and which were in error. I've written to Cisco Press twice, and another reviewer has written several times starting several months ago; there's a section for errata on [...], but nothing for this book as of today. I don't know whether that means that there are so many errors they've just given up, or maybe they've cut back on staffing. In any case, I got the third printing - I'll be curious to see if they correct the author's name on the cover in future printings.
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