Which way to turn...

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Hi,
I was recently doing the CCNA course at the local "college" if you can call it that. Only to find out half way through that it was to be discontinued....and they complained so much about not being given university status. Anyway bitching over basically what i need to know is what reliable distance leraning methods are there? I have already just about enrolled with "computeach." However on some more recent investigation it basically seems like a big con and full of very little substance. This is the next hugely important step i need to take in my life and as i have very little money however, i cannot afford to be pissing it down a drain on a hyped up course. Which to be quite honest is what computeach came across as. The loss leader "exam" you take at the begining, even the way the person pictching it to me talked. He was simply being a salesman, and pushing things with all the very well known and overly used sales techniques, which only work on nieve teenagers or idiots tbh. So if you would be able to advise as to a distance learning facilty to use especially one that focuses on IT courses if possible i would be unbelievebly grateful.

 

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I think the problem with doing the CCNA with distance learning is that you wouldn't get hands on experience with the hardware (they might provide sims though). Have you tried looking on learndirects website for other local collages that offer Cisco courses???

I personally wouldn't use Computeach as I simply don't put much faith in them and other similar providers and their bloated claims.

 

Sly, how do you think I access the routers at my remote sites? Do you think I have to be on-site to administer them? You can certainly get hands-on experience with a real Cisco router remotely!! You won't get to see it... or touch it... but you can certainly log in and administer it!

That said... I'd highly recommend self-study over a course. You could buy a router of your very own with that money!

 

Just to add to what Michael said, check out eBay and see if you can outfit a small CCNA lab. You can also buy the official study guides and lab manuals from Amazon.

 

Not really what I was getting at and I also said that they might provide sims to do the job but I can't image how he would get to use the kit doing a distance learning course (unless I'm missing something). I know you don't manage Cisco stuff at the router last time I did a Cisco course you used a TS session if I remember correctly.

 

Erm, over the internet?

Try Google, people offer lab time for rent at pretty cheap prices if you look hard and wide enough.

The Cisco Press Examination Guides include free (cut-down) versions of the Boson sim software, which gives you a start as well. BTW, make sure you get a guide for the new exams when they come out at the start of next year unless you are planning on booking real soon - and don't forget that many of the current Study Guides will soon be obsolete.

 

...then, as you say, I guess you're just missing something.

 

...meaning, the information in Mac's post is spot on.

 

Thankyou for your responses and thoughts. I would have to agree with slypie that the actual hands on experiece i was getting did help esp as i was very new to networking. Even the simulations were generally buggy and were so formulaic that you didn't so much learn and understand. So i would be kinda discouraged by my own experience to look into doing CCNA from up here remotely tbh. I had thought about looking at the Open University and have requested a prospectus of their short course to sample, then having completed a short one make my mind up as to a longer one or nor. This is just speculation atm though, well apart from the prospectus bit lol. So if anyone has any experience with them that would be great. I chose to look into them as i know they are a credited learning organisation and anything courses i do with them will be a mark of achievment recognised by most if not all. Where-as from what i have heard here and elsewhere about computeach is basically to steer well clear.