A very popular way to prepare for the CCNA exam is to prepare for the practical aspect of the exam. Preparation of this kind is important for both the exam as well as the career of a person. To have this hands-on experience, one must practice in the lab. The best alternative to this is to use CCNA virtual labs. To build this kind of a lab, one needs to purchase either the new or used Cisco switches or routers and set up a virtual lab at home. There are pros and cons of using these kinds of labs. The pros would include the cost of the simulators that are cheap. Also, the virtual labs would comprise of the materials required for training as well. They would have built in lab scenarios. The cons of using the virtual lab are that they cannot simulate all portions of the Cisco IOS. Also, the simulator cannot simulate the real routing of packets. But still, the use of virtual labs is essential since it would give practical experience. Similarly there are plenty of server products that could be tested using the Microsoft virtual labs. These labs could be run on the PC’s with the minimum requirements. There would be downloadable manuals and also 90 minute blocks to test each module. These modules could be added up if required as when the need comes.