joshatterbury #23347 RandS

"This post is all about detailing the time from my first attempt up until today. Disclaimer: I have done very little editing so it is me rambling.

On 15-Dec-08 I failed my first attempt at R&S, I was devastated that night and for half of the following day, The hardest part about the entire experience for me was showing up at work the next day and answering all those questions with ” I failed”. I’m not entirely sure if I was just unlucky or lazy, But If I had to pick then laziness/arogance would have been the one.

About lunch time on the day after I had enough of sulking and feeling sorry for myself, So I decided to come up with an action plan on how I would attempt the lab next, From my previous study and failed attempt I realised the following :
- Speed was not an issue for me,
- I needed to learn the doc cd better
- In reality my only weak areas were qos ( particularly switch based ) and some of the multicast concepts.
- The rest of the content I was very comfortable with and wasn’t to concerned.

Based on this, My new study plan started on the 5th of Jan and at this stage I hadn’t booked my second lab as this time I was going to wait until I had that feeling that I was ready.

First thing I needed to do was cover qos and mcast from the ground up. I used the CiscoPress QoS guide and The TCP/IP guides ( Which ever volume has mcast in it ). First I went over the theory, This was accomplished by writing out the concepts and operations in a notebook. After that I then went through every single command available for Qos. By this I mean I verified the operation of the command, then where it’s found in the doccd and finally created simple scenario labs on the fly just for the specific command to truly understand it. Once QoS was finished I basically did the same thing for multicast but focused on igmp, pim, autorp, bsr and anycast.

After this section of my study was done, I then pulled out Narbiks Advanced tech workbooks, Now the plan was to not *do* a single lab in these books. Instead I read the labbooks cover to cover. I read the qestions, The solutions and then researched the doccd for every section covered. Anytime I ran across something I didn’t remember, It was straight back to the doccd to firstly find it and then hit the examples and configs. During this time there were definately moments when I wanted to give up as reading workbooks isn’t the most exciting thing to do, But I forced myself to as there was no way i could handle failing twice.

This study regimn took about three weeks and finished around Wednesday Jan-21, So I booked my lab for the following Wednesday Jan 28. I managed to get from the 22 till the 28th off work which was great, The following is an overview of each of those days.

Thursday the 22. I didn’t do to much study on this day as I felt I needed a break and spent time with my girl.

Friday the 23. I had 2 x 8 hour ProctorLab sessions booked back to back, As I hadn’t done alot of lab work in the last month I did two mocklabs this day for endurance purposes.

Saturday and Sunday 24/25. Relaxed again, Friday absolutely fried my brain. spent more time with my girl

Monday the 26. Today was a repeat of Friday, Another 2 mocklabs done back-to-back

Tuesday the 27. One day before the lab, My plane left at 5pm, So I bummed around for most of the day with my girl. Arrived at my hotel around 7pm and had an awesome dinner with a few beers at the hotel, I managed to get to sleep about 10pm.

Wednesday the 28.

So Today is Lab day, I woke up about 7am and as the Sydney Lab is a 5 minute walk I took my time getting dressed, This was mainly to slow down and focus on getting my nerves under control. After that I had breakfast at the restaurant and checked out of the hotel around 7:50.

I think the walk to the Lab center is always going to be a fairly solemn event, I Just tried to focus on what was coming. I arrived at the Lab center at 8:05 or so and waited in the foyer for the proctor ( Scott ) who came out at around 8:15. He checked our id, handed out the visitor stickers and herded us into the metting root area. In there we had the usual rundown of rules. Btw Scott’s a funny man, He tried to pretend that the new open ended questions had been moved forward and were being introduced today :). Two of the candidates got quite nervous at that stage.

And then into the lab we went, Officially we started at 08:29. I followed a similar strategy to last time, Except this time I didn’t do any large scale drawings, I used the provided diagrams for large scale reference and only drew specific components as I needed them, I think this made a slight difference. As I read the lab there were a couple of tasks that I thought would give me a headache but otherwise it looked good.

Everyone knows what comes next. I started configuring my devices, The tasks I thought might be problematic turned out to be very easy and that boosted my confidence a bit. I think out of the entire day I asked the proctor to clarify 3 points in total. Now there was one task that for some reason I just couldn’t get working properly, It wasn’t a core task so i decided to leave it till last.

I wasn’t really paying attention to the time so I was very surprised when it was lunch time and I only had 4 tasks to complete. Thats it, Only 4 including the problem task from earlier. I had already completed a very large majority of the exam.

Lunch was ok, Not worth paying 1500$ for though All the guys were pretty chatty which was good for a distraction.

Then back into the lab we went, I finished 3 of the remaining tasks within 30mins, So I Now went back to that problem task from earlier, I still can’t identify why it wasn’t working for me and it had me stumped. At this stage we still had 3hours to go and it was verification time. I double checked everything and found one task where i had missed a key word, Promptly fixed that up and went back to the problem task again.

Still I couldn’t get this task to operate properly so after about 30minutes of hair pulling I decided to forgo those points. I believe that if I kept at it I would have broken something else. I decided to sacrifice those points for the good of the lab ;).

By this stage there were two hours left. I had verified all tasks multiple time except the problem task. Now I know everyone advises to never ever ever ever leave the exam early, Well I got my nerves under control and I ignored that advice. I packed my booklet up, walked out of the lab and upto the proctor and said I’m done. The Proctor was great, He asked me a million times if I was absolutely sure, and then asked another million times just to clarify. I think you all know the rest of the story from here.

Reflection Time:
I am still in shock and this hasn’t fully sunk it. Now the term “Router God” which I used in the title. This term has held a very special meaning for me for a long time, Ever since I first heard about these people called CCIE’s, very rarely did they have names in the stories and the stories were always told with awe. Router gods are those people that have been there, smashed the lab and know their stuff. I’ve made it and this feeling is awesome.

I need to thank Melissa Forro. She is my girl and has put up with all my continual study, stress and general crankiness that often results from a journey like this. My wish was to get those digits before Christmas as I planned propose to Mel on Christmas day and I wanted to be able to be there fulltime for her. Unfortunately it wasn’t so, Yet I still proposed and she said yes, So babe I’m sorry this took me away for a little longer but its over now. We made it."

beschbach

First I would like to thank everyone who responded. And this wouldn't be possible without the support if my wife and family. Plus my wife owed me since I supported her during the bar exam I have been a "passive" member on the forum for a while now and it is exciting to see so many people accomplishing their goals. I know I will sound like a broken record so just bare with me. I started the whole journey in April of this year. I started with the recommended book list and started reading 6 hours a day. I took and passed the written in the beginning of June. Shortly after I scheduled the lab for DEC. 18th in RTP and bought practice labs from "The Brians". Now this is where the broken record part come in....

I was very fortunate that my employer had a full scale lab at my discretion. I took advantaged and labbed every moment I could, over lunch, nights and weekends were spent in the lab. Any question about a technology I had I would lab it up. But first understanding the technologies before labbing anything is a must. You will definitley learn the most by labbing but you first must understand how the protocols function and how they interact with each other. You did this by reading books and forums as well as Video on Demand, from the vendor of your choice of course. But as soon as I read the materials and had a really good base knowledge of the fundamentals it was time to lab. And oh did I lab. My rack time is estimated to be around 1600 hours over the course of 6 months. I also continued to read when I wasn't labbing. I lived, eat and breathed the CCIE. I would go to bed and think of scenarios in my head and try to solve them (my wife didn't like this very much since I would toss and turn most nights). I wanted to be prepared for anything that the lab threw at me. So having an expert level of knowledge for the core topics is a must.

When I first started labbing it would take me 12 or more hours to complete the first 6 labs. I took my time and really made sure that I understood what was asked of me and that I properly interpeted the tasks correctly. As I continued to lab I became faster and solutions would come to me a lot quicker. After completing about 50 labs I could complete a lab around 5.5 or 6 hours. And I could solve pretty much any core topic without hesitation. This came with the number of hours I spent on the rack. I also created "mini" scenarios on specific technologies like Multicast or Qos to focus on my weak areas. This was to ensure that I was at least familiar with most of the non-core topics. And believe me the DOC-cd is your friend throughout the whole journey, not just in your lab. As the time grew nearer I spent more time focusing on my weak areas such as Qos, Security and the dreadful Redistribution. Please tell me if you have ever seen a "real life" network where you have 3 routing protocols. But, the CCIE isn't real life scenarios, it is everything else. I really doubt that I run IPv6 over frame relay but if there is a chance that I do I will be ready:)

Alright so that was a little background on the preperation so lets get into the fun stuff....Lab Day

I took the the lab in RTP. There is a video I think was posted a while back from Cisco that did a walk through of the lab in RTP I believe. But everything is pretty much spot on. I showed up about 6:45 at the front door and there was 5 other candidates waiting outside to get inside the lobby of the building. One of the proctors showed up shortly after and we all sat down in the lobby to wait for everyone else. Around 7:05 the proctor came back out and gave us our badges with our rack numbers. After a briefing on the facilities and the lab environment I sat down at my cube. All cube walls are short and there isn't very much space to spread out all of the pages you need. Plus the monitor takes up quite alot of room on the desk. So after a quick read through of the exam I logged into the CRT sessions. I used the individual CRT sessions for each device, I found it to navigate alot easier. I then drew up my diagrams and my task list with points per task. And I was off....

I approached the lab like any other lab I was doing on my rack. Of course it was different than what I was used to but it didn't take me long to get settled in. My goal was to complete layer 2 and layer 3 with full reachability by lunch. I was fortunate enough to obtain that goal and I got half through the IPv6 section. So when it came for lunch time I estimated that I had around 70 points which was a HUGE relief. Knowing that I had 4 hours to get 10 points was a weight off of my shoulders. I did a quick wr mem and reloaded my rack. Lunch was actually pretty good the food wasn't bad and they had chocolate cake, but leave some for the proctors. I sat and talked with one of the proctors for a while about Cisco in general. Just so you know if you take the lab in RTP your rack will most likely be in San Jose. The environment is a little noisy with constant fan noise. I believe the storage CCIE racks and some of the security racks are in RTP. So after lunch, I sat back down and I hammered through the rest of the exam. I finished with 3 hours to spare, so I did a wr mem and reboot again. I took a coffee break, told Howard, the Packers loving proctor, that the Bears rule and I started going through the exam again. I found 3 small mistakes that could have cost be 8 points but knowing I had the time in the end to triple check everything was a huge confidence booster. I went through the entire exam 3 times and tried to solve each question everytime to make sure I came up with the same solution and that I completed the tasks correctly. I did ask the proctor some clarification on some "loose wording" and they were both helpful, even for a packers fan So with an hour left in the day I was getting pretty antzy. I felt pretty confident that I did well but task interpetation was the only thing standing in my way. I did a final reboot and full reachability test at the end of the day.

After the exam I went back to the hotel to un-wind and ran to get some dinner. About 1.5 hours after I walked out the exam I recieved the notification in my email that my score report was available. But I was pretty confused because it was a very short time that I just got done so I figured the worst like my rack crapped out and I would have to take it over. So I logged in and that was the longest 3 minutes of my life. I scrolled down to see the PASS next to the R&S lab and I jumped for joy, for real. I jumped on the couch of my hotel room and started shouting. I then contacted my wife and family to tell them that I actually passed the lab on my first attempt. This has been a career long journey, this is something I have always wanted to accomplish and I did it. If you take the time to fully understand the technologies and you develop the speed, you can pass. This is exam not only tested my technical knowledge but my time management skills. Like everyone says "SPEED IS VITAL". If you can complete the lab and have time in the end to double check your work you will be one step closer to passing. I hope this write up provides some sort of inspiration for those who are studying. But, the exam is passible and fair. If you study your butt off and remain motivated and positive, good things will come. Good luck to all of you who are studying, I am truely grateful for going through this journey. I feel that I am a better person for it

Igor R. Manassypov, CCIE 23032

Past two weeks have been very intense for me, I put it almost 12 hours a day of straight labbing, but it eventually paid off.
I believe that I had mentioned that I failed my first attempt a month ago, which was quite a shock to my confidence. The most disappointing fact about the failure was that I had this residue the failure was not because of a lack of technical expertise, but rather inability to properly understand the very loose wording of questions. That drove me through the roof, I know that I know my stuff but yet I can not demonstrate the knowledge – that first lab was so vague that I had at least to complete sections where multiple solutions would fit.
So anyways, now about the good stuff. There is a bunch of writeups on what people 'do' to get through successfully. I personally can say about what I 'did not' do -
1.I did not buy any equipment for the purpose of studying for ccie – nada. All I was studying the labs with was my Dell 1850 dual cpu blade server with 4 gigs of memory running Gentoo Linux. Every single lab scenario was run on that box.
2.I did not pay for any Rack rentals or 'Mock Labs'. In my opinion any of those 'mock' labs are graded by 'not your proctor' and not your particular topology. So unless you cant help yourself looking at answers before completing your own lab at home, that would be money well-wasted.
3.Despite what most people whine about not having a life for a period of the study, I did not feel that way. I guess in a sense those complaints make the value of the cert appreciate so much more, but in my case I did not miss out on my normal life activities, at least not entirely.

About the course of the lab itself – I did not create any aliases, shortcuts or any of that auxiliary stuff. I did not mess with any of the default CRT settings either. Neither in the first attempt nor in the second I did not feel any shortage in time alloted for completion of all tasks, if you know what they are asking about – you got more than enough time to get in done. If you are stunned and it is something you'd never seen in your life, only then would it become a time issue. Throughout the tasks, I did not find myself consulting the reference guides. It was comforting to know that they are there, but those only came in handy during proofreading – to make sure the units are correct for example. I did not read more than three-four RFC's, and of course I did not try to memorize every crazy technology out there. Only what is required by the blueprint. As most mention it – your foundation on major topics has to be rock solid, and this is what the lab is testing you on mostly. Again, this is my sole opinion only, but for example I know there is potentially a question on mobile ip that might come up, but I strongly believe that it wont because it is not a 'core' topic. I felt that in both cases 80% of the lab are on core stuff – which is your IGP. The rest is there just to spice it up.
Timewise, the process took me about 7 months head to toe including the written. That time might not be very representative, since I had done my Masters degree in computer networks by that time and I did get a decent exposure at work. On the other hand, both of those factors are all about 'good designs', whereas ccie is totally the opposite phylosophy and I am not sure you can count real experience towards the downpayment for ccie.
There are four and a half invaluable, in my opinion, books which I used for preparation. Those are, of course, Jeff Doyle's two volumes, Cisco LAN Switching, Internet Routing Architectures, and last one is End-toend QOS Network design. The last one has only got select chapters made that book show up on my list.

If enough people voice an interest, I can put up a little tutorial on how to efficiently get going with dynamips. I am a big protagonist of linux, so whatever I explain would be related to pure linux environments. Linux by itself is not a scary thing when it comes to what you need for your CCIE work. In fact, you can get yourself up and running your labs from a blank box in about 30 minutes with linux. Steve [aka FredBloggs] can attest to that

At the end I wanted to thank my friends on this forum for an incredible support and source of inspirations. In particular big thanks go out to Dave, aka ChancesD, Steve, aka FredBloggs.

As the footnote – this thing is very much beatable. Dont dispair if you fail. What matters is the end result and it is totally up to you to finish it where you want it.

And, by the way, stay away from the damned proctors. The Howard guy at RTP is utterly useless sonuvagun.

Cheers and happy coming holidays.


-igor
(CCIE #23032)

--------------------

--------------------------------------------------------------
Igor R. Manassypov, M.Eng., P.Eng, CCIE 23032, CCVP
Network Architect
CI Investments

chances D Rs

"How I passed the CCIE Lab.

On Monday 29 September 2008 I reached the pinnacle of my Networking career thus far, accepting my CCIE (RS) digits after almost 3 years of preparation and painstaking blood, sweat and tears - literally. I would like to share those moments from start to finish with you so that any aspiring candidate can learn from my mistakes and glean anything useful from my studies.


Background
=========
All you need to know is I want my numbers, and I will get them that’s the background driver for this.

Challenges
=========
The biggest challenge I faced on my journey was being a father. Before my son was born last November I had time, but soon as he entered this world that time was sacrificed. I do NOT for one minute regret this, I just found it a challenge to be a Dad, work full time and find time to study. When your 10 month old wants to rip the cables out your switches, it’s hard to say no. I just was the Muppet that had to put them back in!!! No harm done.


Materials Used
============
I started off with the usual recommended reading, Doyle, Parkhurst, Solie, Odom etc. This I found was not for me. I just could not spend more than 15 minutes reading about a serious technical subject with nothing to tie it to. I paused on that and started to rebuild the remnants of my CCNA/P rack. Eventually I took the decision to build it around the NetmasterClass workbooks. I purchased them and before starting any of their labs, cabled it to their standard rack. You will find all vendors have a fixed physical topology.

The final rack was:-
2 x 3560 - Enterprise IOS
2 x 3550 - Enterprise IOS
4 x 3640 - 12.4 - 2xWIC-1T, 2x 1FE-TX
2 x 2621 - 12.3 - 2xWIC-1T
1 x 3620 - BB1 - 1xNM4-AS, 1x2FE-2W
1 x 2620 - BB2 - 2xWIC-1T
1 x 2611 - BB3 - 2xWIC-1T

1 x 2511 - Terminal Server
1 x 2522 - Frame Relay Switch

2 x APC9200 - Remote Power Distribution Bar
1 x 877w - Internet facing Router/Firewall for remote 24/7 SSH access

Built and cabled by me into a 19U cabinet, this rack to me was indispensable. It was relocated twice, from house to house, carried up and down stairs with great difficulty with personal injury in the process – The Blood.

The DOC_CD, need I say more? I spent 15 minutes every day learning to navigate this, finding what I needed. Not once during my attempts did I spend more than a few minutes locating the information I needed. This is the ultimate resource, it’s right up to date and free!!!

Cisco Assesor Labs – I did both of these and found them really, really good. 4 hours mini-labs from which I learnt a lot about the way the grading script works.

Audio – Scott Morris Audio boot camp. On the way to work, I put on a few of these CD’s and it stuck. I was really against this, thinking it is not possible to learn from audio – how wrong I was.


The Preparation, the relentless Labbing' and the disappointments
==================================================
I then started the practice labs in the order based on their (vendor) recommendation, and initially it took me best part 14 hours spread across 1 week to complete the first lab. But this was fine, I was in the very early stages and time at this moment was not an issue. I managed to complete the first 5 labs but was not happy; they were just too dammed hard and peppered with obscure solutions that were not asked for. This was so off putting as I felt I had not learnt anything even after cross referencing it with the books mentioned earlier. So I stopped there and went through the IEATC CoD videos from InternetworkExpert to attempt to fill these gaps. I watched the videos twice and each time I practised small scenarios from it on my rack and gained then a better understanding of the technologies - and that's the key. I didn't want just to pass the CCIE, but also to be a better engineer.

Having completed them I went back to attack the practice labs. I knocked off 5 more NMC labs, with an average rating of 8 and then left the other 15 or so and moved onto InternetworkExpert. I did the first 10 whilst still reading through the books and re-watching the CoD at which point I booked the lab.
I booked it January for a June slot - 6 months to get it all together. During which point I did 5 more labs, 10 rating. 3 from NMC and 2 from InternetworkExpert. First real lab attempt, fail. This is documented on another thread. Down and demoralized, I spent 1 day away from it, back onto the Cisco site and booked second attempt.

Fail. Dammed, this one I knew I had passed, well I had not. I completed the lab in 5 hours as planned, 2 hours verification. Walked out the room to the airport drank a couple of beers feeling like this was it. I got home, showered and fired up my laptop to see those four letters burn my eyes F-A-I-L. What now? I had not made it, fact, nothing was going to change that, and a re-read is just an excuse for Cisco to pick another 300 USD from your pocket, statistically I did not stand a chance. Let it go. I just dissected in my brain why I did not pass, and after days of reciting the lab I realized I made small mistakes that cost points and collectively this put me under the 80 point bar. Petty mistakes, mistakes that you can ill afford. I needed speed from my first attempt but I also needed deadly accuracy.

I decided to go back, I will not be beaten for love nor money. I scheduled attempt 3 a little ahead and this time I changed materials to get a different perspective. I used the Narbik Workbooks to go over the mini-scenarios he presents so well. Again, on the rack practicing the little labs. But not only that, but breaking them too. If OSPF works, then break it - forcefully break it with a odd command and see what happens, debug it and see why it broke, not just how.


The Day it happened
===================
If one was ever to get off to the worst possible start then today, 29 September 2008 was it for me. There is a saying, "the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry". After I failed my lab last time I wanted to leave nothing to chance, my preparation this time had to be military precise. I changed hotels, I arrived earlier to acclimatise etc. I decided I would travel scruffy and the day of the lab I would wake at 5:45am, have a shower and a clean shave, eat a light but filling breakfast. Clean appearance, clean mind, that was the plan.

Wrong. My alarm failed to go off, I woke at 7:20am - 25 minutes before I was meant to be in the Cisco office!!!! In fact other guys were there sitting, waiting whilst I was still dreaming of...let's not worry about what I was dreaming of, whilst stuck in a hotel in a foreign country, without my wife. The first 4 words I spoke after I saw the clock when my head peered out of the bed sheets are simply un-repeatable and defy the laws of human nature. I jumped out of bed, threw my old clothes back on, no shower, no wash, no shave, no clean clothes, no breakfast. Nothing. Threw everything into my backpack and within 3 minutes I had left that hotel. No checkout, just ran like a mad man down the street towards the Cisco office hoping I would make it in time. I was never in danger of not making it to the centre, I just had to make it for my own mentality. I arrived sweating like a pig, flustered and just not right. I managed to swing things back into my favour and get my mind right. - The Sweat

There on in I attacked the lab.

Step 1 - Environment. Log onto Terminal server and apply my standard config. I always do this in real world and force of habit meant I did it again. Just no ip domain-lookup, alias, screen colour, re-mapping keys etc. This had to be right and it was. Wobbly fingers were still there, just not for so long. I was experienced now remember?

SecureCRT Ammendments:-

Re-map key F6 -> CTRL+SHIFT+6+x
Re-map key F5 -> CTRL+SHIFT+6+6
Re-map key F11 -> Clear Console Screeen
Re-map key SHIFT+Z ->Mapped to produce the '|' (pipe). I had problems with this first time as the keyboard is US.

Change Font to FixedSys with Yellow on black Foreground/Background.

Alias Commands/Basic Config:-

no ip domain lookup
ip cef
logging console
!
alias configure ro router ospf 1
alias configure re router eigrp
alias configure rb router bgp
alias exec c conf t
alias exec sibe sh ip int brief | i eri
alias exec sibn sh ip int brief | i net
alias exec sibl sh ip int brief | i oo
alias exec srr sh run | b router
alias exec sion sh ip ospf neigh
alias exec sibs sh ip bgp summ
alias exec siro sh ip route ospf
!
line con 0
history size 100

TCL Script:-

foreach ip {
1.1.1.1
2.2.2.2
3.3.3.3} {ping $ip}

Macro Ping for Switches:-

macro name PING
do ping 1.1.1.1
do ping 2.2.2.2
do ping 3.3.3.3
@
macro global apply PING


Step 2 - Read the entire lab slowly. It's very tempting to go in, and in fact I did last time. This time I sat and read the entire lab from start to finish and at the same time tied it to the topology. For (a fictitious) example, the IPv6 task wanted R1 to do this to R2, so I visualised it onto the diagram to see how that would work.

Step 3 - Diagrams. I did 1 from the start, and then 2-3 later on. The first was a re-drawing of the main diagram but I put all the IP information on, as well as a note as to which switch each port was hanging off. As I progressed through the lab I did smaller diagrams, for example, a inter-switch diagram when I got to the Switching section, an IPv6 one when I got there, and a Multicast one when I got there. Just showing the relevant devices. I got this idea from NMC, and it worked perfect for me.

Step 4 - Target and time management. I decided that by lunch, I wanted to be on this task and I worked to that by deciding on how I would answer the questions. I did not to the top-down processing approach, instead I went for my strong areas to get the points on the board first and then pick off the others. I came to 2 questions that had me puzzled, but onto the DOC_CD a bit of digging and I managed to formulate a solution. Approaching lunch I ahead of schedule. I ran a tcl and everything looked good, I had end-to-end which was huge step, I had the rack under control and I was in control of it. During lunch, I recited in my head what I had done, mentally annotating each task and ensuring I did not miss anything.

Step 5 - Post lunch. Target was to complete the whole lab, sounds odd I know, but I did not want to leave a single question unanswered. I had time on my side, and with a content stomach I was on a high. I raced through the remaining sections and completed the whole lab by 1:20pm. Run my tcl script and macros and picked out a few IP's that were not playing as a result of a later task, fixed that and I managed to get end-to-end again. That’s' start to finish in 4 hours and 40 minutes. Leaving me lots of time to check. Fantastic, I felt unhygienic on the exterior but my mind was fresh and now I was ready to test.

Step 6 - Verification. Before doing this, I went to the breakout room and grabbed some drinks and some fruit to just get away from it. It was as if I wanted to stare at my lab now from a different perspective. But first a reload, my first of the day. I was confident I had no loops as I had taken care of that but a reload but prove it. I wanted to do one before lunch, but decided not to and leave my rack as it was. A quick reload, it took seconds, they are fast devices another tcl and macro, everything looked good. I was in confident mood and was not tired, after all I had a great sleep remember?

I carefully went through every question again and verified each task against my rack and I recovered, I would say 9 points. In the grand scheme of things this could have been the difference between a pass and a fail. Wow, 9 points. Silly errors, petty errors, trivial errors - last time I missed them, this time they were there for the taking and I took them.

Step 7 - The final run. Now I’m bored, the lab is done, I had done my tests, everything pinged and I was content. What do I do? I have 1.5 hours to kill, and I did not want to kill my work, so do I walk out - no way. I am NOT coming back again for this bitch, that's what I told myself. I did another reload and another tcl and macro ping and then I had some fun with the proctor. I asked him some really random question and he looked at me and laughed and said, "go back to your rack and check everything again - with a hint of sarcasm" I did, and when time was up I walked out and thought, who knows - pass or fail - now I don't care I want some fresh air and I want a shower.

4:50pm Brussels---------->>Home 9:30pm

I walked through my front door and my wife said "you stink" I just did not have the energy to respond. I just wanted to see my son and then have a shower. Little man was asleep and I was stopped from going to his room. My wife told me to check my result, I just wanted a shower!! So I compromised, grabbed a beer, Stella ironically and I logged onto the Cisco site, my heart was pounding as if that smelly Gorilla was thumping me. As the page eventually refreshed I saw the # symbol and the words certified, I just dropped my laptop stood up and told her, I’ve got it. I really cannot describe to you the joy and emotion that I experienced the time I saw my result. My journey had come to a magical climax and I shed an emotional tear, the only time I did this before ever in my entire life was when my little boy was born. - The tears.


The aftermath - Lessons I have learnt
=====================================
Shortcuts. There are not shortcuts to passing your CCIE lab, there may be for the written, but not for the lab. You need time and dedication, those that don’t have those attributes will fail, those that do will pass, maybe not at first but eventually.

Complacency. Don't become complacent and lazy, if you think it's wrong then the chances are it is. If you think it's right, chances are it's still wrong!! Check it, and check it again. And when you have finished checking the checking, verify it.

Speed and accuracy. To pass the lab in sub 8 hours you need to be quick and accurate, in my failed attempts I was not quick and I was not accurate. On my winning lab I had the speed and I had the accuracy. I had the lab topology where I wanted it, under control from start to finish. How do you get to that state? Practice, practice and more practice. If you can write configs' in notepad without the ”?” then you are on the right track. I remember in my run up to the day, doing the IEWB labs partially, I would do up to the core as fast as I could, and then stop. I did this for labs 8-13 I think. Just to the point where I had Bridging/Switching and IGP and then stop. I managed to clock it down to an average of about 2 hours.

Vendor Diversity. One vendor workbook in my view is not enough, you need 1 and a half at least. One main one for your labs and then a second one for a different perspective. You can become far to accustomed to one authors way of writing.

Getting help. The DOC_CD is the only help you get in the lab, and the only help you need. If you can find a core topic in under 1 minute 15 your in control. a non-core obscure feature in 2 minutes. Nice

Make friends. Before, after and during the lab make friends. Flying to Brussels, or any location is not cheap, on top of that you have the cost of the lab and the hotel etc. Shop around, as others, hotels in Brussels near Diegem are expensive. The Holiday Inn Express was 65 Euros when I went last, this time they wanted 165.00 Euros, for the same little room. I stayed at Etap this time and it was cheap and clean, and walking distance.

Get some rest and watch what you eat. This is the biggest and most important thing. I hardly slept the night before my previous attempts. In fact, I slept too early. Having arrived at the hotel after my flight I had an afternoon sleep and it meant I was not able to sleep later on, big mistake. When you are tired you make mistakes, and these mistakes cost you points. After lunch you are the most vulnerable. Ever been had a meal and felt tired after you sat down? I’m sure Cisco do this on purpose, give you a free meal ticket and say have what you want. A large lunch, chips, chicken and a nice sweet dish after is a cocktail to make you tired. And when you are tired you make mistakes!! Eat light and keep your body hydrated. You are not there to sample the cuisine, you are there do an expert level job, right?

It's good to talk to save money. After each lab attempt I had a chat with the other candidates, not violating the NDA but general chat, and as a result I managed to get a free taxi ride to the airport saving me 20 euros each time. See, most people there are going home right? Most people head to the airport right? So, I just shouted out "who’s heading to the airport" I get a response, offer to help with the taxi fare and they turn round and "say no problem, my company is picking up the tab, you can share with me". Nice. Same goes for the shuttle to the hotel, if your hotel does not have this service, or you missed the bus, then jump on some other hotel's bus. Most hotels in that area are near each other, maybe 5 minutes walk, so just jump onto another hotel's bus as no one checks.


Don’t give up. If at first you don’t make it go back, no need for me to explain this. I have failed and passed the lab, and as a result I am a better and more knowledgeable as a result of failing it. I think there is more shame in not going back than there is to not passing.


The thanks
=========
This forum has given me so much and it’s difficult for me to give praise to individuals, I don’t like to do this, but it’s fitting that several people here made it possible. So – thanks to, MarkinManchester, DarkFiber, ZGX, Igor_M, Darby Weaver, a61971, Hotdogs, N00b13, georgevzz, FredBloggs, toofast, Lord Flasheart, Route-Reflector, richerich, sabbione, Ciscocool, Lethe, Cisco_Master, Ford_Mustang, Big_Evil, -.-, airflow, Russian macho et al.

And Finally FS for reinstating me!!! Cheers mate.


What Next
========
Another CCIE? You bet!! Security.........


I hope you enjoy reading this as much as I had preparing it, please feel free to ask as many question within the confines of the NDA as possible. I have sacrificed a lot to get my numbers, and I am not going to lose it so you can get yours!!"

airflow

Hi there,

this week I had my first attempt for the security ccie, and I'm glad to tell you that I passed on the first attempt!

My preparation was
* 4 years experience in the area at work
* two month of very intense preparation (got "free" from work from my employer and could basically learn from the morning to late at night)
* creation of a "knowledgebase", where a added every bit of information I didn't knew before, or was hard to "get" and understand, and was worth noting. I think this is a must for two reasons: first you memorize things better and easier when repeating them and putting them into your own words and writing them down, secondly it's good stuff to go through all this again shortly before the lab to see again all "pain-points" you had and their solution
* the 10 mock-labs from internetwork-expert (very valuable!), which are harder than the real one to my mind - together with a real lab where you can train of course
* a great day on the day of your exam, where you are relaxed, not too nervous, confident and having the support of your friends and family in your background.

This is what I had, and what obviously made me pass it. Good luck to all the others!

Before I forget: my number is 21049, and if you really feed the need to verify it (what for?), you can get my full-name on my website http://fp.ath.cx/ (I don't want to post my full name here).

greez,
airflow

Cisco4lyf3 Rs

"What did I do to pass?

I am not going to talk about books or lab workbooks too much, because the vendors don't really matter that much. I have used Internetworkexpert (my preferred), NMC and Ip-Expert. I could have passed with any one of these had i known then what I know now.

I put in crap loads of hours. I had no job, so that helped. I put in approximately 300 hours a month for the last couple months. I probably invested about 2000 hours over the last couple years. The last few months of preparation, I really learned to study. Its not about quantity, but its about quality and keeping a routine. In hindsight, I could have passed this exam much faster had I managed my time more appropriately, and not slacked off the routine.

Learn the technologies.

I don't know how many times I had heard and ignored this. I started this journey with the attitude that just doing the practice labs were key to learning. It is so far from the truth. I kept getting hung up on the same topics in the workbooks. I finally stepped back and regressed to the Internetwork Expert technology labs. My final month of preparation, I did not do any full labs (I failed the lab on my first attempt the month earlier). I spent lots of time working through the technology labs over and over, and using the Doc CD. By far learning to use the Doc CD is what really pushed me over the top on my 2nd attempt. The answer to almost any question is right there for the taking. On top of that, I constantly built new dynamips labs and did concept testing on everything I had trouble with. Debug everything so you can see how it really works, and don't take anyones word for it. Go see for yourself!

I have read a lot of books over the years, but honestly, the only topics I went outside of internetworkexpert (WBs and CODs) and the doc cd were QOS and multicast, just because I needed a better understanding. If you do the tech labs, and the WB labs, topics like OSPF, BGP, EGIRP, etc... will be pretty easy to you, if you are studying well. BGP is a monster of a topic, but trust your IE workbook. They test you on what you need to pass the exam.

For QOS I read a few books and watched the Knowledgenet vids.
For multicast, I watched the knowledgenet vids as well. Their multicast vid is actually quite good and in depth. It gave me a different perspective and filled in a lot of the gaps from the IE COD.

Ultimately, focused study was the key to me passing. Rather than wasting 4 hours going through a lab and building core, just so you can study the topics you suck most, don't do it. Do the tech labs or build your own topic by topic, until you feel you have a really good understanding of each topic, then do full labs. Even after that, i would go through the IEWB vol 2 workbook and read over only the stuff from the topic I was working on that week, and solve them in my head.

Routine.

Don't fall off the wagon. I studied in 4 hour blocks, with almost no exceptions. Your dog needs a walking? Too bad. He has to wait. Baby drop a bomb in the diaper? Your gonna have to smell that shit until your study block is up Having at least an average intelligence and good old fashioned routine are what you need for the knowledge to sink in. Also, no matter how smart you are, you might not pass on your first run. Shit happens. You make a typo and configure Lacp instead of pagp, you just lost 3 points. Those things happen to the best of us, this is where the routine helps. Practice at your best, do not slack in any one thing. Test as you go. Go back and retest in the end. I found a crap load of errors after I completed everything and went back through it. Just stupid stuff, where I might have changed a parameter to test a feature, and forgot to change it back to what the lab asked for. Practice at home and simulate your lab day. Certainly putting in 8 hours a day might be impossible for most people, but 4 hour slots are not that bad. Sticking to the schedule is key.

I did not use a bootcamp, and did not have any funded training. I would have loved to go to a bootcamp, but just did not have the money or support through work when I was working.

Besides the message boards, CCIE study is a lonely endeavor. Unlike going to college, where you have structure forced upon you, CCIE lab study is all on you, and your ability to force the routine. I know I sound like a broken record, but this is just a test and you have a good study routine to pass it. You don't only have to want it bad, you have to make rules for yourself and stick to them.

Cisco4lyf3 "

manx ccie r&S

"Guys,

Couple days ago I passed CCIE lab exam. It was my second hit. As you already know I tried it in the december for the first time, and I was just couple of points under the line. It was very frustrating, but I made break for 3 weeks, and after that I started again.

I used these lab preparation materials in the last 10 months:


1) IEWB 3.0 - I did all 20 labs twice. WB should be used as resource for getting to know real lab format questions, not to learn technologies.

2) I had my small home lab in wich I practised IEWB scenarios and warious routing tasks that I could invent for myself. I tried to find out what should I see in debug output if I have working configuration or if I had non working configurations.

3) I did not practised switching a lot, because I am having it a lot of it in my daily job, and switching in both my attempts was no problem for me, so that is the main reason why I did not chase IEWB 4.0.

4) I never find a good QOS book that will meet my requirements: precise explanation, good diagrams and clear sequencing of QOS mechanisms, so I use everything I could find about QOS and read it (evry QOS book that I could find on GS and tons of files from CCO).

5) I mastered non-core topics from DoCCD."DocCD is your friend" - this is 100% true .

6) I did not use any rack rentals, I used only my home lab and ASET labs.

7) I went to Heinz Ulm's 3 weeks CCIE R&S bootcamp. I heard very useful tips and tricks on the bootcamp, and find out that I should improve my time management. BTW, time management was the reason for my first attempt failure.

I hope this guidelines will help someone who is starting with lab preparation, and I wish you all good luck on your lab exam!!

HTH,
ManX "

Rodrigo Hernandez, CCIE#17162

"This is what I used for the exam:

Books:
Routing and Switching certification guide, its from Cisco Press.
Routing TCP/IP Volume 1 from Jeff Doyle, also Cisco Press
Volume 2 of the Jeff Doyles Book

First, I read the routing and switching guide and then the Jeff Doyle's books, but I reccommend doing the opposite, the Doyles cover everything in detail, so you want that first, then the cert gudie, covers everything with less detail and adds some new features that the other books dont cover.

After reading this 3 books I did and passed the written test, this took like 1 or 2 months.


Workbooks:
I used internetwork Expert's core lab workbook and volume 1&2 complete workbooks, thats like 40 labs and lots of hours.

I first did all 30 labs from the workbooks and then the core labs, but, again, this is not what I recommend, its better if you do all Vol.1 labs then all cores and then all Vol.2 labs, if you can do some of them 2 times, do it!

I did from 2 to 3 labs per week, did 1 lab and the next day I graded it. One week I did 4 labs and the last study week I did 8 (from sunday to sunday, exam was on wednesday)

*note: this will be what gives you all the practical knowledge, so do it!


Videos
After my first lab attempt, I realized I had much more to learn, so I used some videos, this were the CoDs form Internetwork Expert and the CBTnuggets.

The CBTnuggets were the first I saw, they are short and can teach you some things with out boring you. Have some mistakes, so you need to validate some things, but they are OK and short. Wont hurt if you use them.
Then I used the IE CoDs, those are some good videos, but if you are like me and used to sleep at school when the teacher is talking, it will be hard, I couldnt finish the videos because they are too big, so I slept in most of them. If you like taking class, use them!


Mock Labs
I did the 4 Internetwork Exper Mock Labs, they are really cool since they are actually graded by people, not an automatic script. I did one after the 20 Vol.1 Labs and 3 on my last study week, gave me a good feel about the exam and how it is graded.

*note: Be careful, sometimes IExperts fall down the schedule and send the results like one week after you make the exam.


Racks
Didnt have a home rack, so I used the IExperts one, they are ok and perfect if you are using their workbook, since you dont have to config the FR switch and have exactly the same topology. They have a good customer service also.


DocCD
VERY IMPORTANT! use it daily, use it for work, use it for studying, use for everything! why? maybe you wont use it at all for the exam (I used it for 2 questions) BUT will give you a huge boost at work, you can find everything there, so use it! know it! 2 questions can be either a pass or fail.

Tips before the exam
-The week before try doing some labs, but dont over study. I did labs daily, but if I was tired I stopped.
-Try doing some labs without a PC, do it on your mind and just see if your thinking was right, this is less stressful and if its your last study day (or days), you wont learn anything new (if you did study well)
-Arrive to your hotel 1 or 2 days before the exam.
-Take some books to the hotel, maybe you wont even open them, but it wont hurt you.
-Take the workbooks to the hotel and if you want to study a little, do some labs in your mind, do it fast, you can finish one in 30 mins, BUT DONT MEMORIZE THE ANSWERS!!! THINK!!!!
-The day before dont study, go to eat, watch a movie and sleep. No need to be nervous.
-The day of the exam, have a nice breakfast! get a shower!
-Dont fly the same day.


Tips for the lab
-Read all the lab once and quickly
-Check the diagrams (I didnt draw them again)
-BE CALM
-Ask any doubt to the proctor
-Resolve everything quickly so you get lots of hours to check answers
-READ EVERY WORD!! AND PAY ATTENTION!
***VERY IMPOTANT: ENJOY!!!!!!!!


The best thing I can tell you is enjoy the exam and the study and you will become an expert. If you work at something you like, its not hard.

I passed the lab with 5 months of studying, less than one year of field experience, was 23 years old and passed on my first attempt, so dont listen to those recommendations


DONT DO THE EXAM IF YOU DONT ENJOY CHALLENGES AND NETWORKING!



Rodrigo Hernandez, CCIE#17162"

nooch

I studied the CCNP and CCIE track from March 05 until July 06.


Books
========

Routing
Routing / TCPIP Volumes 1 + 2- Ciscopress - Covers topics: Basic routing principals, TCP/IP, BGP, EIGRP, OSPF, Advanced Routing, Multicast, IPV6, and etc. Not a one stop shop but basically a bible for routing.

OSPF Command Reference - Ciscopress - Basically the DOC CD in printed form. Is a little older.

BGP Command Reference - Ciscopress - Basicall the DOC CD in printed form. Is a litle older.

Routing and Switching Written Certification Guide - Ciscopress - Very good book as it summarizes all topics in Routing / Tcpip in my opinion. Also covers all topics on written blueprint

Switching
Cisco Lan Switching - Ciscopress - A little outdated but the fundamentals still apply.

Multicast
Developing IP Multicast Networks - Ciscopress

IPV6
IPV6 - hxxp://www.ccbootcamp.com - their IPV6 book is very good. It is 40 pages of theory and about 60 pages of nothing but IPV6 labs. I liked it and learned all I needed to know from this book, and the DOCCD.

Lab Books
Internetwork Expert Practice labs
NLI / CCBOOTCAMP Practice labs
Netmasterclass Practice labs
and repeat... ;-)

Videos
Internetwork Expert Class on Demand - Priceless, they want you to learn the material and not just pass the lab.
CCIE R&S CBT Nuggets - It's like Diet Soda VS Regular, it comes up light. It is OK maybe for the first stages of CCIE training. Not informative enough.

The following from Knowledgenet:
BGP Module, Multicast Module, and a few others... I forget for now.

Classroom Training

Unitek - CCIE Written - 5 days intense lecture. I was prepared for the written before I went, but work covered it so it was a cool refresher. Passed written exam on site.

Unitek - CCIE Lab - 6 days intense configuring - lecture after each lab. There were 6 people in the class but the training itself was one-on-one. The labs were outdated and included ATM/ISDN so we had to take the time to edit that stuff out. Not impressed by it considering it was in May - 5 months after stuff was removed from the lab. The instructor however made up for it and was pretty good. His name was Rahim Roufi.


Aside from that I lived, ate, and breathed the DOC CD. The configuration guides and command references are priceless.

Ryan McKinney CCIE #17074,

"First of, I started my CCIE preparations last year about December. I started with Reading the standard books.

Routing TCP/IP vol I & II. I actually did all of my studies off of Vol I first edition and the re-read the 2nd ed when it cam out. I recommend reading the 2nd ed.
I also browsed thru Cisco Lan Switching, but the entire books is based in CAT OS so I ended up going back to my CCNP BCMSN (Cisco press) book. I think it pretty much covered what I needed to know. It is actually a pretty good book.
I used the QOS book (Cisco press) for CCVP.
I referred to the BGP commands and configuration guide as needed.
I referred to the OSPF commands and configuration guide as needed.
In the last week before my written, I used TestKing.. (yes I used TK, but only after I felt I have a strong background in all of the core topics)
I took and passed my CCIE R&S Written on March 11.
I bought the CCIE Exam certification guide after I passed the written and read it. It is much more useful it you get it before the written, because it is mostly for the written.

I then played around a little bit on the CCIE Practical studies VOL I until I started my class in June.

On Just 6 I stared a bootcamp in India. I attended Ip Solutions R&S Lab bootcamp in Mumbai India. It lasted for 1 month. Basically I sat in front of a computer with a Full Lab sitting next to me and for 8 hours a day I completed Labs with a CCIE instructor helping me. The class itself was 1 month, but I stayed a little longer, (about 4 more weeks) and utilized the equipment doing Internetwork Experts labs. I really liked them and felt they thought me A LOT.

CODEwww.ipsol.net


I got back to the states in August and continued to do Internetwork Experts Labs with online rack time. I used Internetwork Experts online labs a few times, but mostly used CODEwww.ccie2be.comas they are cheaper for the time. Their equipment is set up perfectly for the IEWB.
I made sure I could get thru all of the IEWB labs. I did 1-30 and repeated 1-10.
In Late August I signed up for an IEWB Mock Lab and did pretty well on it and then I signed up for the CCIE assessor Lab. I did well on it too, so I figured I was ready.

I sat my lab for my first attempt on Sep 8 and feel I came pretty close, just not close enough.

After that I was pretty discouraged for a while and did not study at all. I was just being lazy but really wanted to continue but did not have my heart in it. I scheduled a trip to Hawaii and for the day after Hawaii, I set up the Heinz Ulm bootcamp.

So, after my trip to Hawaii, I flew directly to Denver and sat in Class with Heinz Ulm for his Mock Lab bootcamp. October 9-13CODEhttp://www.heinzulm.com/mocklab.php
That ended and I had one week before my Lab Date of October 20. I made a deal with Heinz and utilized his Online Labs until the following Thursday morning. (day before Lab) I used that week to do a few more of his labs and go thru the DOC CD every chance I got to find things I knew I might need to find in the real lab.

I sat down on Friday, Oct 20 and was pretty confident. I was finished with my IGP and had started BGP before Lunch. When i got back form Lunch, I continued with BGP and moved on to the rest. I had completed my entire Lab with the exception of one security Task I never got to work right. I ended up leaving it alone because I felt it would mess me up in other areas because I never did get it right. I got up to leave about 1 our before time was up, but for some reason came back to my seat to run a few more tests (LUCKILY). I found one thing that was broken from one of the later tasks I did, and fixed it, after that I could not drag myself away from the seat until they told me to go. I ran ping, Telnets, and Trace routes to EVERY SINGLE IP in the Exam. I highly recommend that if you have time, do it.


--------------------
Ryan McKinney
CCIE #17074, CCNP, CCNA, CSPFA"

Shaughn Smith CCIE # 23962

Yes, I finally passed on my 3rd attempt.

I finished the Lab before lunch and spent the rest of the time
verifying. Once again the jitters set in straight after the lab.
Working out things I might have done wrong etc. But I worked out that
I only lost 6 marks that I know. So I was hopeful.

Well after 1 year worth of studying and 3 attempts I finally did it. I
am over the moon to say the least.

I would like to thank my Wife, she has supported me through all of
this and I wouldn t have been able to do it without her, also thanks
to everyone on GS that helped me along the way.

Now to learn how to relax again and what to do with my extra time. Oh
this is for SP

Thanks All
Shaughn Smith


CCIE # 23962