CCNP 350-501 SPCOR

I am starting study for the 350-501 SPCOR exam to recertify my CCNP Enterprise (R&S). As part of this I am going to blog the exam topics and materials I am using as there is no official certificate guide for this exam. Each page focuses on a section from the exam topics/blueprint and the corresponding materials (books, blogs, cisco documentation etc) that I am going to use for study.

My inspiration is the CCIEv5 Learning Matrix Spreadsheet but rather than a spreadsheet I will use markdown in a blog format adding links to materials to the relevant section.

I am putting together a lot of this information myself, but I am also using/adding links from this Reddit SPCOR and SPRI Study Materials Superthread as there is a lot of good information linked in there already.

CCNP SPCOR Exam topics:

Cisco Learning Network: 350-501 SPCOR Exam Topics

Software versions:

There is no list that I could find of the IOS-XE and IOS-XR software versions specifically for the 350-501 CCNP SPCOR exam. There is a software version list for the CCIE SP v5, and I think that this will be sufficient to assume the same versions for 350-501 SPCOR.

The below is a list of software versions from: CCIE Service Provider (v5.0) Equipment and Software List, I removed Cisco Network Service Orchestrator (NSO) as the only mention of NSO in the exam topics is to describe its role only.

RR, P, and PE role: Cisco ASR 9000 Series running IOS-XR 6.5 Release
RR and PE role: Cisco ASR 1000 series running IOS-XE 16.6.5 Release
PE and CE role: Cisco Edge Routers running IOS-XE 16.6.5 Release
Access and Aggregation: Cisco Access series running IOS 3.2.1S Release

Lab

For lab equipment I am using an eve-ng server and ill be specifically focussing on the topics with the “implement” or “configure and verify” keywords, for example: Implement IS-IS, OSPF, BGP, configure and verify control plane security, BGP sec etc.

I am using the following lab images:

- CSR1000v 16.06.07 Denali
- CSR1000v 03.17
- XRv9K 6.0.1

For the study schedule, at the moment I am working on one and a half hours a day at least 3 days a week with two hours each weekend day. Of that I wll be allotting time to reading the material, implementing what I have just read and writing a short blog post on the topic or part thereof.

I will see how I am progressing (or procrastinating) and adjust time wise based on how I feel I am progressing versus the time spending on each task eg: reading, writing or labbing.

Discipline and consistency

This is the most difficult part, keeping consistent when work and life get in the way. Historically I have not set an exam date from the outset, generally I will get the exam topics or cert guide and just start reading, taking notes and throw in the odd lab here and there, however with no deadline it is easy to loose focus and progress.

I have 12 months to recertify the CCNP, which could slip away quickly timewise without a structured plan. My aim is to sit and pass the exam before the end of the next 6 months, so as this is the case I will look at booking the exam date once I finish blogging the list of study materials for all the exam topics. It will be interesting to see if having the exam deadline in place helps with my focus.