This message never made it through so after several people asking me how I did I decided to repost it. -- Joey Below is the message I sent yesterday. BTW when I said I used 3 things, I meant I used 3 things to study for the exam. Without breaking the NDA, the first 5 questions were on my worst subject, I had a 25% section score on it. Knowing Multicast and spanning tree saved me. I passed with a score of 759. I things it is one of the lowest scores I've ever received but oh well. As expected I did poorly on troubleshooting - 40%. Everything else was closer to par. I keep a running tab when I take a test. I have a column with "yes I know that answer" and "maybe" and another for " No way " 10% were now ways with 40/40 split on the maybes. In my opinion I the test should be harder. I did have some duplicate questions, but I've heard a lot of people say the test was ambiguously worded. I have to disagree. I had some questions where the first 2 times I read a question I thought that not enough information was given to come of with an answer or there seemed to be more than one answer. But you'll find if you reread the question it will hit you what they are looking for. About half-way through I was running behind on time, but I hit a batch of easier questions so that by the end of the test I had 16 minutes to spare. I knew that I didn't pass. I was wrong. While I used the CiscoPress book to study I found it hard to concentrate, it wasn't not written to keep your attention. As Joe Friday would say " Just the facts maam ". After reviewing the areas I did poorly in I'll be going on to study for BSCN. I really wish they had made the switching exam harder as it would set a higher standard for people to achieve it. Just my 2 Cents. I hope this helps others looking to test. I won't review what needs to be studied since most others have already mentioned what really needs to be learned. Joey -----Original Message----- I'm scheduled for the switching exam in less that 2 hours. I figured I'd drop my thoughts in before the exam so they are untainted by the exam experience. I'll post a follow-up tomorrow. I have hands-on experience with the Catalyst 5000, 4000 and 29XX series. We are in a small network environment however so very little of what I studied had I ever used. I used 3 things. I started by reading the CiscoPress book in August, and I got to the chapter about Inter-Vlan routing, when I got too busy. Well the middle of October I went back to the books, and started the book over, the concepts were much clearer this time, so about half-way through I used the COLT exams on the CCO site. I scored a 29 of 63. I then finished the book early November but still didn't feel confident. I took a COLT exam about this time and got 43/63 (49 is passing), I felt better considering the things I had heard about the COLT but went ahead and bought the BOSON test 2 weeks ago, and I've scored between a 50% to 80% ( + or - ). Since then when I have been able to I've squeezed more studying in and went over the areas I felt weak in. I would have liked to do this for another week or two, but due to the "prevailing winds of uncertainty" at my place of work, I've advanced my time frame. I feel I have an 70/30 (in my favor) chance of passing. I've found Cisco Exams to be harder than any Scumsoft errr... Microsoft exam I took getting my MCSE. However I much more NT experience than Cisco experience. Just my thoughts. I'll include a follow-up tomorrow and perhaps combined it will give you a feel of how hard the test is. Listed below is my confidence level with each area: 1=Low 10=High Trunking - 9 Broadcasts - 9 Multicasts - 6 VTP - 9 Routing -7 PIM - 6 Multi-layer Switching -7 Fast Ethernet - 10 IP Multicast -6 QOS - 7 Security - 7 Tag Switching - 7 Static VLans - 10 Troubleshooting -5 IOS -6 Port config - 8 I'm sure I'm leaving other areas out, but I'll see. I think the IOS could hurt me. I understand the concepts and remember most of the commands, but have a hard time remembering which order the parameters go. Another week of studying could fix that. I'll wish myself success and hope this helps others. Thanks, Joey Fowler _________________________________ FAQ, list archives, and subscription info: http://www.groupstudy.com/list/cisco.html Report misconduct and Nondisclosure violations to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
