CCNA Data Center: Introducing Cisco Data Center Technologies Study Guide: Exam 640-916

I don't normally do reviews, but I thought I would for this pub. Todd Lammle has always found a way to make Cisco Systems certification guide books that are clear, concise, and always easy to read/absorb. His guides for CCNA - Route and Switch have been the standard for some time now. For most, it is the book that opens the door into the world of networking. Though it took a while this installment to get published, this guide follows suit of the others. It is the boiled down information you need to pass the exam. Do not get me wrong, if you want to dive into the minutiae of protocols and RFC's, there are other guides. If you want to concentrate on the absolute essentials to pass the exam, buy the book.

Not adequate for exam. Use the Cisco book even though it is horribly overlong. Lammle's regular CCNA book is great and so is his first CCNA DC book but the second DC book is underneath him and his abilities. You will not pass with this guide.

Best book available for the test, period. Although it lacks content from the updated tests. It is still the best book. You'll have to use this book and some other material. good luck finding it though.

You've only got two choices, this super short, easy to read incomplete book that seems to be based on out of date dumps, or the 1000 page Cisco Press book with 5 authors and no editor that spends an inordinate amount of page space to irrelevent topics (like how SCSI used to work back in the 80s), is poorly formatted and repetitive (like each author submitted a draft for a chapter, and they just pasted all 5 drafts back to back in the book)If you can find the videos done by Jason Lunde, they are the best single resource, but you will still be spending time with the plain old Cisco Documentation. And probably watching CCNP and CCIE videos at INE.COM. Neither of the two books published are adequate. No single set of videos are adequate. And the Jason Lunde videos are no longer available as IPExpert went out of business. He is working on new ones, so look him up. But I think they CCIE oriented.I'd recommend using this one as a guide to what topics to study, and as an intro. Then hit the Cisco Documentation. If you aren't accustomed to reading Cisco Docs, you are going to have a hard time. But unless you have hands on experience with Nexus and MDS switches, Cisco UCS blade enclosures and Fiber Channel concepts, no single resource will be adequate. And this one is worse than most.

Those who study for these qualifications know the format well. This one covers in a little detail some of the new range of Cisco kit Nexus series which does ACI and SDN. The interesting piece for this is that this range is what is getting pushed for not just on prem intallations but also for geographically diverse data centres due to low latency capability. All this is very new and we're installing one of them on site. It does not go into it in great detail as you would expect.It does cover typical designs and how these have changed as a result of virtualisation. Also covered is the UCS hardware. That has been around some time now but it isn't something that I've come across that often.

This is a decent enough title, but doesn't seem to be up to scratch compared to previous series entries by Sybex and more specifically Lammle, who I have long considered to be the King of Cisco-based certification texts. There isn't enough depth of knowledge in here, IMO, to get you through the exam, and I'd recommend you seek out supplementary training materials along with this, which provides nothing more than a general grounding on the curriculum.

My husband is currently studying towards his CISCO qualifications and he finds these books invaluable. They are jampacked full of theory, explanation and lots of oppurtunities to further knowledge through practice and experience.

These CCNA study guides don't leave a stone unturned- in-depth exam guidance with access to test simulators and the like which is really handy. Very much a specialist handbook for a niche qualification, but if you are going along this study route this is an indispensable book to guide you firmly towards your goal.

Very complex and in depth guide. Includes access to lots of tools and simulators and small tests. However you really need to know your stuff before even picking up this book. The book is a little dull and the pictures are all in black and white. It does cover a number of exam topics in detail. This book is preparation for the 640-916 exam.