Networking Certification?

[terencemckenna]

Hey I'm currently studying psychology at college,but would love to get my network certification so I can start working part time or maybe start working full time and studying part time.

Which of the different certifications out there can land you a job? Which ones could you study for from home and then write the exam to get certified or do some of them involve doing practical hours of work?
I know you can do your A+ and N+ certifications from home and then just go and write an exam to be certified.
I spoke to a friend who is working as a junior network engineer and he has the following:
1. MS Certification think he has the networking one and the MS server certification, 2. Cisco certification 3. N+ and 4. A+
He did go to some technical college though for a year to get those.

What else is there that I should know about being a network engineer? That friend of mine told me that he sometimes gets calls from work at early hours in the morning about really stupid things e.g the printer isn't working. (He is the junior network engineer though, so guess he gets picked on)

How can I learn more about networking? Any cool ebooks that you could recommend?
I maybe wanna talk to the network admin at my college and ask him if I can help out a bit during the holidays, just to see what the job is like.

Don't get me wrong though...I dont wanna do this for a living. I just wanna be able to manage my network and servers myself oneday when I have my own business cause I wouldn't trust someone else to do it for me.

[Goatboy]

Notice: I do not have any of the certs I am about to mention, so for all I know I could be spewing shit.

I have generally heard that the CISSP (Certified Information Systems Security Professional) and CCNA (Cisco Certified Network Associate) are the major networking-related certifications. CISSP basically deals with security, and CCNA deals with configuring and maintaining a medium-sized network. Of course there are many other certs, and these are fairly low-level compared to some, but for any networking job I can imagine you'd want to have one (or both) of these.

Perhaps this page can help a bit more: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cisco_Care ... ifications

I've also heard good things about the CompTIA certs. They are the ones who issue the A+ and Network+ that you mentioned. There are a few others (Security + and Linux+) that might be of interest.

As for e-books, I can't name any off the top of my head, but you can look into the O'Reilly books. I've never heard someone say "God, I wish I hadn't spent time reading that O'Reilly book. It sucked." I have to agree, as they are all pretty high quality both in detail and scope.

[terencemckenna]

Cool thanks yes the Comptia certs look pretty good...i just looked through a brochure of the technological college that my friend went to and the majority of the certs they offer are done via Comptia.

[Vulpine]

I've got the A+ and the Net+, and they definitely help with job hunting. But, if you just study for them and pass the exams, essentially making yourself a paper-tech, you'll just end up disappointing whoever hires you. So, get something set up at home that you can practice with. Theory + practical knowledge = you're golden, Poney Boy.

The A+ is probably the easiest cert out there; It's all hardware and basic Windows. You could study for it in a week or less with one of Mike Meyers' books. The Net+ is a good deal more difficult since it covers a pretty broad range of networking topics, but I had a blast preparing for the test. Basic networking concepts, like the OSI model, properties and characteristics of various cabling, physical and logical topologies, network devices, routing, protocols until your eyes bleed, WAN, wireless, security, administrative work, and tons of hypothetical troubleshooting... That's probably a relatively comprehensive list of things that you'll need to know. It's all pretty easy stuff, though. I would probably steer away from Mike Meyers if you take this one; I found his Net+ book to be marginally useful and mostly too watered down to be taken seriously.

I've heard good things about the CCNA that Goatboy mentioned, but you'll probably want to get the Net+ under your belt before going for any Cisco certs.

The CISSP, you'll definitely want to probably forget about for a long time. Not because of the material, but because of the requirements to even sit down and take it. I'd be surprised if anyone here met the criteria for it.

[msbachman]

The CISSP, you'll definitely want to probably forget about for a long time. Not because of the material, but because of the requirements to even sit down and take it. I'd be surprised if anyone here met the criteria for it.

The requirements are absurd.

Were a person to have 5+ years of full-time work experience in security fields, why the hell would they take it?

I emailed (ISC)2 (lol, their name even reeks of elitism) about this, we'll see what they say in response.

[terencemckenna]

Hmm this is fucking dissapointing what do you guys think of this?

In January 2010 these ANSI/ISO approved certifications fundamentally had their conditions changed from lifetime certifications to certifications that will expire every three years. Current certificate holders will still have valid certs for life, but any new certifications earned after December 31, 2010 will expire every three years.[1]

[Goatboy]

I think it's great that people should need to re-certify. Imagine someone with a 1990-era cert trying to apply that knowledge to a job today. There was virtually no wireless back then, commercial fiber-optics were unheard of, and if you talked about phishing they'd ask you to get some bait and a pole.

[hellow533]

It is good to have to re-certify. Unless it's A+ or net+, you should need to re-certify so you don't get too far behind. CISSP you still need to get annual CEU's.

[LuckY-BeanZ]

Im not sure if you are still interested in this thread but Cisco are at the top of the food chain when it comes to networking. Taking the CCNA examination would be well worth your time, and also starts at the very basics. if you find you enjoy that then CCNP is a slightly more advanced level and focuses more on routing protocols,rather than just configuring a network and getting it working.

CCNA security is another good cert, but prior knowledge is a must.

[Reason7194]

"and if you talked about phishing they'd ask you to get some bait and a pole." made me lmao.

My uncle got his certs in 2009, lucky him indeed.