Need some advice on learning networking

[BillyCarpenter]

I have a question for you guys that do networking. Do copier companies hire guys that have their CCNA? The reason I ask is that it seems to me that it would be a big waste of education for anyone that has their CCNA to work for a copier company. I say that only because they would be way over-qualified for that job.

Yes? No?

[slimslob]

I have a question for you guys that do networking. Do copier companies hire guys that have their CCNA? The reason I ask is that it seems to me that it would be a big waste of education for anyone that has their CCNA to work for a copier company. I say that only because they would be way over-qualified for that job.

Yes? No?

Copier manufacturers often offer training to their dealers. I know that Ricoh offered and paid for CompTIA A+ and EFI Fiery training through the Ricoh University. The dealer or tech if they wanted certification would have to pay for the testing. Lanier Worldwide voice and word processing systems at one time offered a course on Novell Netware 3.x.

[BillyCarpenter]

Copier manufacturers often offer training to their dealers. I know that Ricoh offered and paid for CompTIA A+ and EFI Fiery training through the Ricoh University. The dealer or tech if they wanted certification would have to pay for the testing. Lanier Worldwide voice and word processing systems at one time offered a course on Novell Netware 3.x.

From what I read about CompTia, it trains a person for an entry level job like Help Desk. That's just what I read when I was doing my research for deciding what course that I wanted to take. I figured if I was gonna do this that I would choose the harder one.

[slimslob]

From what I read about CompTia, it trains a person for an entry level job like Help Desk. That's just what I read when I was doing my research for deciding what course that I wanted to take. I figured if I was gonna do this that I would choose the harder one.

6 IT Certifications That Can Help Launch Your Tech Career

https://www.rasmussen.edu/degrees/technology/blog/it-certifications/

[BillyCarpenter]

Here's something new that I learned today: A layer 3 switch is NOT, I repeat, is NOT a router. Can anyone tell me why? I'll give it a little while then I'll post the answer.

Here's the answer.


A layer 3 switch is not a router. It has some router "functions" but is not a router.


1. There is no WAN port.

2. It can't perform NAT.


What it is good for, though, is inter-vlans. Personally I prefer a router on a stick for inter-vlans.


PS - slim PM'd me with the correct answer...for the record.

[rthonpm]

From what I read about CompTia, it trains a person for an entry level job like Help Desk. That's just what I read when I was doing my research for deciding what course that I wanted to take. I figured if I was gonna do this that I would choose the harder one.

CompTIA certs have their place. I have an A+ and Net+ from them and you do get a good grounding in the fundamentals of a topic. For you, Net+ would be covering a lot of the same topics: OSI, subnetting, etc, just without the specific stuff related to Cisco and configuring the concepts.

Most low level CompTIA certs are seen as a way to demonstrate high level knowledge or to initially learn the concepts with a test at the end. As you get higher into their certs they become a little more challenging and can also certify you for other organisations as well (Linux+ does that).

For 90% of people here, the CompTIA certs would give you enough of a grounding to do just about anything you'd need to in the field with a decent grasp of networking and related concepts. By the time you get to the CCNA level, you're much more of a specialist as opposed to a generalist, and if switching and routing interests you, it will open a lot of doors.

Back when I was with Lanier, it was mandatory for techs to at least have the A+ cert. I even have the no longer granted PDI+ cert, which was intended for the basics of printer repair, though I got that later as a way to get a little bit of an edge when bidding on a decent sized contract.

Learning will always keep the opportunity coming.

Sent from my BlackBerry using Tapatalk

[BillyCarpenter]

CompTIA certs have their place. I have an A+ and Net+ from them and you do get a good grounding in the fundamentals of a topic. For you, Net+ would be covering a lot of the same topics: OSI, subnetting, etc, just without the specific stuff related to Cisco and configuring the concepts.

Most low level CompTIA certs are seen as a way to demonstrate high level knowledge or to initially learn the concepts with a test at the end. As you get higher into their certs they become a little more challenging and can also certify you for other organisations as well (Linux+ does that).

For 90% of people here, the CompTIA certs would give you enough of a grounding to do just about anything you'd need to in the field with a decent grasp of networking and related concepts. By the time you get to the CCNA level, you're much more of a specialist as opposed to a generalist, and if switching and routing interests you, it will open a lot of doors.

Back when I was with Lanier, it was mandatory for techs to at least have the A+ cert. I even have the no longer granted PDI+ cert, which was intended for the basics of printer repair, though I got that later as a way to get a little bit of an edge when bidding on a decent sized contract.

Learning will always keep the opportunity coming.

Sent from my BlackBerry using Tapatalk

I appreciate you sharing your knowledge and experiences with everyone. When I started this thread my goal was very simple: I wanted to learn how to network a copier. That's it. That's all I wanted to know. I mean, I could network a copier but if there was a problem, I was in trouble. I didn't know which way to turn.

At some point in this thread I became hooked on networking. Networking to me is as addictive as crack cocaine. "Hi, my name is Billy and I'm addicted to networking." lol

As far as the certs. go.... I respect anyone that puts in the time and effort and learn something new. I don't find any of this particularly easy to learn.

[BillyCarpenter]

I thought I'd share this. Below is a practice test exam that I had to complete. I'll post a picture of the network that I had to subnet for. Basically here's how it works. This is real world stuff.

You're given an IP address and told to subnet for 3 different departments. The IP address that I was given is 192.168.1.0/24.

I had to subnet to get 1 subnet for each department and the to take the last subnet of the 4 and to subnet it again with a /30 mask (/30 has only 2 possible hosts) for the serial links on the 2 routers.

I'll admit that it was a bit confusing at first, but I got it now.


See network:

Network 26.JPG

[BillyCarpenter]

By the way, I learned so much by learning subnetting. Let's see if I can explain and make it make sense.


For one, subnetting allows us to conserve IP addresses. More importantly, I think, is that it cuts down on broadcast traffic. Can you imagine a HUGE network where no subnetting was used? The amount of broadcast traffic would be out of control. Sure, VLAN's will cut down the broadcast traffic for the network that the PC's are on but what the networks for inter-connected routers? They're not on any VLAN.


Here's a question. Why do we use a /30 (255.255.255.252) subnet mask for 2 routers that are connected together?

Anyone?

Here's a hint: Think switches and ARP requests.

[bsm2]

I appreciate you sharing your knowledge and experiences with everyone. When I started this thread my goal was very simple: I wanted to learn how to network a copier. That's it. That's all I wanted to know. I mean, I could network a copier but if there was a problem, I was in trouble. I didn't know which way to turn.

At some point in this thread I became hooked on networking. Networking to me is as addictive as crack cocaine. "Hi, my name is Billy and I'm addicted to networking." lol

As far as the certs. go.... I respect anyone that puts in the time and effort and learn something new. I don't find any of this particularly easy to learn.

Apparently NOT
Training for certifications takes hours weeks or months of study.
Difference is 15 minutes to find the problem or 2 hours without a clue.