Trouble Spots
Cisco offers voice certifications at the associate, professional, and expert levels. Therefore, many CCIE Voice candidates will have earned their CCNA Voice and CCNP Voice (formerly CCVP), and anticipate they might be ready to take the CCIE Voice Written. However, much of the content appearing on the CCIE Voice Written exam is not found in the CCNA Voice or CCNP Voice curriculums.
Also, be aware that the material someone with their CCNP Voice has been exposed to will vary with when they earned their CCNP Voice. Specifically, in October of 2010, Cisco revamped their CCNA Voice and CCNP Voice tracks.
The old CCNA Voice track consisted of the IIUC1 course, which primarily focused on Cisco Unified Communications Manager Express (CUCME), Cisco Unity Express (CUE), and the Cisco Unified Communications 500 Series for Small Business. The new CCNA Voice track consists of the ICOMM course, which exposes the learner to a wide variety of Cisco voice technologies, including Cisco Unified Communications Manager (CUCM), CUCME, CUE, Cisco Unified Presence Server (CUPS), and Cisco Unity Connection.
Similarly, the courses in the new CCNP Voice curriculum (that is, CVOICE, CIPT1, CIPT2, CAPPS, and TVOICE) include coverage of CUPS and Cisco Unity Connection, topics not addressed in the older CCNP Voice curriculum.
Since the CCIE Voice Written exam covers CUPS and unified messaging topics, the typical CCNP Voice certification holder who earned their stripes with the new curriculum will be better prepared than one who completed the prior CCNP Voice track. That being said, the CCIE Voice Written can still hold surprises for those not familiar with the exam blueprint. (NOTE: You must be logged in to Cisco’s website to access the exam blueprint.)
For example, CCIE Voice Written exam candidates should be ready to answer questions on topics such as: Cisco Unified Contact Center Express (UCCX), unified communications (UC) security (for example, DHCP snooping, firewall, and NAT topics), and IP multicast.