Books

[MitelUK2010]

Can anyone recommend any good books to brush up on networking. Not to in depth but to assist when deploying VoIP. Also looking for a book on general telecoms from VoIP to isdn etc...... Any recommendations would b appreciated.

[bobcheese]

Hey Miteluk2010, I still say the best thing for me was doing my CCNA. Obviously you can just buy the books but there is no sibstitute for playing with the actual hardware and although its Cisco specific the basics of networking are covered and to be honest the commands for switches etc are pretty similar to HP etc.
A lot of colleges and some high schools offer evening classes to study CCNA and it may be worth exploring if your company will fund. All together mine cost about

[MitelUK2010]

appreciate your response. Time is tight at the minute so would stuggle to do the exam etc at the. Do you reckon the cisco literature is worthwhile in the meantime? if so could you clarify if this is the preferred book -

http://www.waterstones.com/waterstonesweb/products/todd+lammle/ccna+-+cisco+certified+network+associate+study+guide/5603804/

Thanks in advance

[bobcheese]

Think that is based around an exam that has been superseeded now. The new CCNA curriculums are known as 'discovery' & 'exploration' with the later being the most like the old CCNA. Most of the info will be the especially the fundimentals. Guess it depends if you are going to sit the exam ir not if no then the book you posted should be finr. If yes then look at the Cisco books of which there are 4 for exploration first of which is http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/aw/d/1587132087/ref=redir_mdp_mobile/279-1704841-2799413

[MitelUK2010]

Took your advice and bought that book. Thanks for the recommendation.

[bobcheese]

Don't forget that only covers 1/4 of the full CCNA curriculum. Good books though and look for the program 'packet tracer' on the cd at the back, its pretty cool

[Chakara]

  IMHO CCNA covers WAY too much info, and very shallowly.  For voice you are really just interested in QoS (WAN and LAN) - basic switching - etc.  Unless you are doing it for a large organization in which case you need a route/switch guy or depend on the customers IT staff.

  I wish I had a recommendation for ya.....learned the hard way myself   Well, maybe the easy way as we have some really smart folks on staff....

-Chak

[martyn]

I haven't read it myself, but I came across this book on a blog that I'm following and reckon that it could be a good read even for those with some knowledge in networking already.
It looks like it covers a good range of topics, including QoS as Ralph mentioned, and will give you a good solid base to work off of.

[ralph]

Here's the Amazon link:
Network Warrior

(Full disclosure: this is an affiliate link)
Ralph

[martyn]

Another way to see if it is any good for you, along with thousands of other books, is a Safari online subscription.

So far I've read the first 6 chapters of the network warrior book, and must say that it is pretty good. It may be a little brief in some places if you don't at least have some basic idea of networking, but for me it covers each topic well enough, and gives you the positives and negatives of implementing certain features, as well as things that will catch you out.

I'll keep working through the book, as so far it's only covered switching, which for voice at least is a key component. There is a voice specific chapter as well, which I'm not up to yet, but looks to be interesting and informative.