THE IMPLEMENTING AND ADMINISTERING CISCO SOLUTIONS EXAM - ALL THE INFORMATION YOU NEED TO KNOW

Overview

CCNA 200-301, Implementing and Administering Cisco Solutions, is one of several new Cisco exams that were announced in June 2019 as part of their most comprehensive career certification program update since inception (all the way back to 1993). Besides announcing newer exams, Cisco also revised rules for recertification as well as introducing the brand new Cisco DevNet certification. The changes took effect on February 24, 2020.

CCNA 200-301, or Implementing and Administering Cisco Solutions, is an Associate-level exam in the 200 series. If you want to learn more about Cisco networking, you should take this exam. According to the newer program format, the CCNA R&S and Enterprise Infrastructure exams are no longer available, i.e. there is only one CCNA and even that is no longer a prerequisite for the CCNP.

Retired Exams

The Cisco 200-301 exam replaces the following eight CCNA exams that have been retired.

Older CCNA Exams

Routing and Switching (R&S)

Security

Collaboration

Service Provider (SP)

Wireless

Cloud

CCDA

Industrial

Topics or objectives of the CCNA Exam

There are six sections in the Cisco CCNA 200-301 exam. I have analyObjectivesficial CCNA exam blueprint and found that 36% of the exam topics covered within the official CCNA exam blueprint are theoretical whereas the remaining 64% require some level of hands-on activity.

1. Network Fundamentals (20% weight or about 20 questions)
2. Network Access (20% weight or about 20 questions
3. IP Connectivity (25% weight or about 25 questions
4. IP Services (10% weight or about 10 questions
5. Security Fundamentals (15% weight or about 15 questions)
6. Automation and Programmability (10% weight or about 10 questions)

Let’s now cover each of the exam sections as defined in the official Cisco CCNA exam blueprint.

Fundamentals of Networking

Topics covered in this section include network components, topology architectures, physical interfaces and cabling, IPv4 and IPv6 addressing, NAT, TCP/UDP protocols, wireless principles, virtualization fundamentals, and switching concepts. In this section, 77% of the content is theoretical, while 23% requires hands-on experience.

Access to the Internet

Topics covered in this section include VLAN, interswitch connectivity, CDP/LLDP, LACP, STP, WLAN components, and WLAN access for client connectivity. About 45% of the content in this section is theoretical, whereas 55% requires hands-on learning.

Connectivity via IP

The topics covered in this section include routing tables, forwarding decisions, IPv4/IPv6 static routing and first-hop redundancy protocols. Only 20% of the content in this section is theoretical, while the other 80% requires hands-on experience.

Services over IP

Topics in this section include NAT, NTP, DHCP, DNS, syslog, QoS, TFTP/FTP and SSH. In this section, 56% of the content is theoretical, while the other 44% is hands-on.

Fundamentals of security

The topics covered in this section include key security concepts, device access control, remote access and site-to-site VPNs, ACLs, DHCP snooping, DAI, AAA, and WPA. About 60% of the content in this section is theoretical, while 40% requires hands-on experience.

Automation and Programmability

The topics covered in this section include controller-based networking, software-defined networks, data encoding format such as JSON (pronounced Jay-sun), REST APIs, device management with DNA Center, and configuration management tools such as Ansible and Puppet. In this section, 86% of the content is theoretical, while 14% is practical.

If you compare the CCNA exam to the older, now obsolete, CCNA R&S written exam, you'll notice they're very similar except for the section on Automation and Programmability.

CCNA Exam versus the TCP/IP Stack

In my opinion, comparing the new CCNA exam 200-301 with TCP/IP networking stack is the best way to contextualize it. I have mapped out the exam sections to respective TCP/IP stack layers in a diagram.

CCNA Exam and Job Task Analysis (JTA)

As a junior Enterprise network engineer, your exam should align with your actual role. In the Enterprise Infrastructure space today, what are the actual roles available?

1. Network Engineer
2. Network Automation Engineer

With those two roles in mind, it is easy to see how the CCNA exam aligns well with both. Each of these roles is addressed by the CCNA exam, but mastery requires passing some of the CCNP level core and concentration exams.

CCNA Exam Fees and Costs

The CCNA exam costs $300 for each attempt, as do all 200 and 300 series exams.

Fees for CCNA Certification and Recertification

The only way to become CCNA certified is to pass the CCNA 200-301 exam, so we're talking $300. You have multiple options for recertification, so things get more interesting. The following five options are available for CCNA recertification.

1. Pass CCNA exam again ($300)
2. Pass one core exam such as the ENCOR ($400)
3. Pass any one concentration exams ($300)
4. Pass any CCIE Lab exam ($1600)
5. Use Cisco Learning Credits >=30

It is worth noting that in the newer Cisco certification program format, all certification cycles last three years.

CCNA Exam Preparation

Depending on your background, it can be a tough exam.

If you have a CCNA R&S background, you will be familiar with most of the topics, such as the routing protocols- my analysis suggests that they make up 76% of the exam. However, if you come from a CCNP R&S or CCIE R&S background, you might find as much as 90% of the exam topics familiar to you.

Learning and Study Plan for CCNA 105 Hours

I have put together a 105-hour learning plan to help you prepare for the CCNA exam that you can follow. Please watch the video below to learn more about the CCNA learning plan.