I failed my CCNP 350 401 exam , So right off this article is not click bait. The first time I took the exam I failed for those that don't know I was trying for the encore. Exam and cisco was doing a 50 off coupon recently, And I thought what the heck I'll take advantage of it. Now I loosely studied for this exam, Probably about six months and I would say it was definitely difficult.
How do I put more effort into particular areas? I think I would have done better, But I think the exam was pretty fair. I originally planned on taking the exam in april, But because of that promotion I thought well, If I can save 200 and I pass the exam it's a win. So, Needless to say, I scheduled the exam.
Um went ahead and took the exam, And I missed it by just a little bit. I think it was like a 789. I mean it was still a little bit off, But I felt I felt like I missed it close enough based on my scores. I didn't do really good on network assurance and I'll show you that here in just a moment when I pull my scores up, But I did end up failing the first attempt, And so I thought to myself: well, I missed it. Why don't? I just reschedule it for my original exam date in april, So that's what I ended up doing but then, Once I really looked at the areas that I filled in, I thought what the heck, Let's reschedule and try again, And so that's what I ended up doing And I'm happy to see it's flipped, But I passed so my second attempt I did pass . I I definitely blew my score out of the water.
I got 100 in several areas as well, So I'll be excited to show you that let's go ahead and pull up my report for my first time around and let's pull up my second report and then I'll get into what actually I use to pass the exam. So I've got logged in here to the pearson vue website on the cisco side and let's go ahead and go to exam history, So you can see here back in august of 2019, I passed the csun exam then that same year in november I went And took the icnd2 to get my ccna, Then, On february the 24th I took the encore exam and failed. I rescheduled it to april the 12th canceled that because then I took it on the fourth and actually passed. So let's go back and let's pull up . My score reports so the first time around I I failed right, But I was pretty happy with my score as far as I kind of took it on a whim a full month ahead of when I originally was going to take it.
But if you look right here, This is what really hurt me network assurance. I only got 30. I was getting hit with some sla questions that I thought I knew, But once I got to those questions turns out, I didn't so.
I got hit really hard with sla. I did pretty good with architecture and virtualization virtualization for me was pretty easy, Just because I work with vmware esxI every day at work. So, For me, That was pretty easy architecture is something that I really love the design aspect of networking.
So I did pretty well on that as well infrastructure. I did and security and automation. I could have done better, But I feel like if I would have scored at least a 70 here in network assurance. I would have passed the first time around, So my initial score was 774 and it was a fail. Let's go ahead and look at my passing score and this is a big improvement, Especially in network assurance after I failed the first time around. I wanted to be sure that I passed so I really studied network assurance and you can see I got 90 of that.
So this time around, I actually finished the exam a lot faster first time around. I probably only had maybe 15 minutes left for the exam this time around. I I want to think it took me a little, Maybe an hour which seems really fast and that's because it was. I got a lot of the same questions I had the first time around, So I caught those questions pretty quickly and I think that was an advantage of retaking the exam. So early was some of the questions were still in my head after the exam, And so I immediately jotted down some of the questions and I was like , I got hit really hard with sla.
Let's study that and several other things without getting too into detail what I struggled with particularly the network assurance pretty much snnp stuff like that. That's where I got hit the hardest in the first exam and that's why I failed. But regardless you can see, My second report is a lot better virtualization, I'm proud of. I got 100 there architecture, I improved infrastructure. I improved network assurance security and automation.
I improved in every one of those and my final score was 889. Now I want to say if I would have taken more time, Because I did finish the exam super early had I taken even more time to sit there and read some of the questions I probably would have scored above 900 on my ccna exam for my icnd 1 and 2, I did score a 900 on my I sent or this I sent on the csun exam and I scored. I believe, Like at 889 somewhere around that range so I scored 896, So I've been scoring kind of in the same area and with all of my cisco exams that I've taken so far.
So that's where we're at so really excited about passing this exam. Let's get into the resources that I actually use to pass the exam and hopefully help you where you're at so the first thing that I use to pass the exam really is - and this is in no particular order, Although I do want to give a shout Out to ine, I've used cbt nuggets it pro tv and I used ine for all three or excuse me. I use all three of those article on demand services for this exam, But ine really was the game changer for me once t changed their pricing.
I switched over and started using it for the first time and the way t break down some of the topics. A lot of people don't like this about ine, But t get really in depth, But for this type of exam I found that that helped me out more as far as the the depth that t got into cbt nuggets and it pro tv both did a phenomenal Job and I think t are more of a higher level overview in some areas, But ine really was the deciding factor for my score in the second exam, Especially on virtualization, And some topics like that. It really helped solidify some of those topics. I want to think automation, I would have to say: ine definitely has the best material on automation it pro tv was also great.
I think it pro tv kind of made it more an entree style where it was a smaller to break down. So I'm really happy with ine or excuse me it pro tv. I I think I've said that wrong. I t pro tv I'm really excited for what t did. T kind of broke everything down into smaller articles which was really manageable.
I used cbt nuggets for my first exam with cisco, Which was my csent, And I used it for my ccna. The icnd2 jeremy is is phenomenal. I don't think anybody can say anything about about his teaching style. It works for me and I think the way that he puts the topic out there and spins it off as something fun and exciting. That is what made it extremely valuable for me, However, For this new exam for the encore to me - and this is just my personal opinion - there was too many instructors on the instructors on the exam for the articles in particular, T just it was all over the Place, I didn't feel like it was structured as clean as ine's or it pro tv I feel like it was kind of shotgun shield and I don't feel like there was as good as collaboration as far as the instructors were concerned: jeremy keith barker network chuck.
I think those did really well on their topics. Jeff kish did really well as well. I think there was several other instructors on there as well. I think all of them did well on their topics. I just feel like in some areas. It was just all over the place, Jeremy's bgp section phenomenal.
I think that is the best bgp articles, At least that I've seen on cbt nuggets ine and it pro tv in particular jeremy's personal youtube channel. I think it's called keeping it simple one of his articles on bgp really helped me in the exam, I'm not going to say what particular article it was, But be sure you check out his personal youtube channel to keep it simple. He has a article on there on bgp, That was on the exam again, Not saying which one it was, But hopefully you'll find it. So I ine cbt nuggets it pro tv.
Those were the three article on demand services I used, But I also used kevin wallace's youtube channel. He has a bgp path, Attributes article be sure to check that out as well. That really helped me solidify the path attributes in bgp. I feel like the ocg was something else that I used, But I feel like the ocg's bgp section wasn't as in-depth as it could have been, Especially when it come to route management, Filtering and stuff, Like that, I did have some of those questions on practice.
Tests that I took that I was like this wasn't in the book so again check out all these resources. This may not work for everyone. This is just stuff that I use next thing I use was boson, I think I've. I definitely have used them for all of my exams, T're phenomenal.
T really are busan, The xm netsim. All that is really great. I used boson for my first two cisco exams and I used it for this one.
I think the the xm, Is pretty on par for the exam. There's. Definitely questions on the exam and on the boson practice software that you're just sitting there and you're kind of scratching your head. That's that's a lot of of what this exam consisted of, So I think t really hit the nail again with their practice exams be sure to check that out as well.
One of the last things I did was lab. Now this exam was more. I feel like theory, But I did have quite a few configuration questions on this exam and it it came in handy to lap some of the stuff so be sure that you check out either netsim even g gns3. Some of those I used all three. I didn't use packet tracer this time around for my first two I did this one was just some of the topics were so advanced that you just it's not possible in packet tracer, So even gns3 as well as boson netsim.
I used all three of those. I constructed my own labs and even gng and s3. I'Ve made several bgp labs that I like route, Pre-pending and stuff. Like that. I lacked that a lot I didn't lab so much filtering for, Like let's say, Ospf eigrp .
I did maybe one or two labs on that, But I really focused on bgp for me it's a it's a very cool protocol to play around with and try and affect the attributes on it and affect routing. So I played around a lot with that. But again, This is in no particular order of the stuff that I actually used. There's probably a lot more that I can't think of off the top of my head, But this was just kind of a simple list of the stuff that I did use. So with all that being said, Where I'm at now is, I will be focusing on starting next week, I'm going to be focusing on doing the ansarI exam, I'm not sure how to pronounce it, But it is the advanced routing. I'Ve went ahead and picked up the ocg book.
I'm going to be doing the same resources, I'm going to use cbt nuggets it pro tv ine, I'm going to be using all of those article on demand services, As well as the official cert guide boson, And this time around I'm going to heavily focus on labs. I think again the encore exam. I wasn't expecting some of the questions that t asked in regards to configuration just because I feel like it's all over the place. This exam really is all over the place on topics.
So if I had to give any advice, Know your show commands know why you would issue a certain show command and make sure you know the output of those show commands as well as the configuration again there wasn't any questions were it was like a simulation sort Of like for the ccna exams where it was configure this and you actually got to do it, But there were questions on the exam that you needed to know the configuration. So if you go under the exam blueprint - and you see configure know how to configure make sure you know how to do that, Because it will be on the exam. At least it has a high chance of being on the exam. So again, I'm moving on now to advanced routing.
I think once I complete that I'm probably going to move on to some of the more specialist exams from cisco I really like sd-wan, So I may do that, One as well or I might move on to devnet. I haven't really decided which path I want to take. I did start on. Several weeks ago I started on the nsc exam, Which is, I think, The network security expert, That's by fortinet .
I started on that we'll be using fortinet here pretty soon. In production, Where I work at on for the firewall and I'll be pretty excited to get into that. So hopefully this is just going to be a quick short little article on the stuff that I used for the ccnp 350 401 exam as well as an update that I did pass, Although I failed the first time. So thank you for reading.
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