From: John Mistichelli (jmistichelli@xxxxxxxxx)
Date: Sun Mar 24 2002 - 22:54:29 GMT-3
Well done Manny. You certainly have earned the certification and will
represent CCIEs everywhere smartly. I am proud to have met and worked with
you.
John Mistichelli
7536
-----Original Message-----
From: nobody@groupstudy.com [mailto:nobody@groupstudy.com]On Behalf Of
Manny Gonzalez
Sent: Sunday, March 24, 2002 7:56 PM
To: ccielab@groupstudy.com
Subject: #9013
Hello everyone,
My turn to tell my story. I passed the R&S CCIE Lab in RTP this
Saturday. The two proctors were great... they helped me understand that
little twisted question here and there. It was my first try and I am
really glad I did not change my scheduled date. It paid off by being
really prepared. I want to say that I particularly found the exam to be
tough. Superficially it seemed okay, but as you read the questions, you
see they are a lot deeper than you first imagine.
Okay, for those who like the full story, I will now write a little about
what my road to the CCIE was like.
I started out in networking back in 1994. I got the job at the company
because I really knew DOS and Windows and they needed to start moving
away from dumb terminals to PC's and Novell Netware.
A few years ago, a friend and I were walking past the Sylvan room at
Networkers and we decided as a joke to take the free test. We chose the
CCNA because we figured it would be easy. I mean we did this sort of
thing everyday. We both failed. Interestingly, we failed the basic
portion and got 100% on the advanced topics.
This opened our eyes to certification and decided to get serious about
it. The next year we were back and aced the CCNA.
Two years ago, I was working on my CCNP Switching exam (I had already
passed the Routing) and my friend started working on his CCIE. He
decided to skip out on the CCNP altogether and put in the work for the
CCIE.
He got his number last year. I then decided to do the same and go for
the CCIE rather than CCNP and then CCIE.
I passed my written on June 26th, 2001 in Los Angeles at Networkers. I
scheduled the Two Day Lab on the 27th. I started studying really
seriously for the lab on September 17th when I took ECP-1 with Mentor.
My instructor was Rick Burts (hope you are listening because yours was
the first CCIE level course I took)
Since Mentor went bust, I had an opportunity to take another class since
my company felt like being generous. I then attended NMC-1 with Bruce
Caslow, Val Pavlichenko and Fred Ingam. This was an eye opening class. I
learned so much more than I had up until that point. Really useful tools
and techniques. And invaluable test taking methodology.
Thanks to:
My wife. She suffered the most and felt great when I passed (I wonder
why)
My first advanced networking course instructor John Mistichelli
Rick Burts was the instructor of my first CCIE level course (ECP-1)
Bruce, Val and Fred of NMC. Fred taught me the value of being an ace at
binary to decimal and decimal to hex and bit swapping etc. etc. Bruce
has a way with teaching that just makes you want to learn. And Val
taught me to take control of the rack and MAKE THINGS HAPPEN. Debug your
heart out. As Bruce says, it is therapeutic :-)
"The Guys" at work without which I could not endure the long hours in
the lab. Leo, Akbar, Billy, Gam, Ed, etc. etc. etc.
What I did to prepare:
Bridges, Routers and Switches for CCIE's by Bruce and Val... The Bible
... REQUIRED
Read Basam Halabi's First Edition and Second Edition cover to cover.
Twice... REQUIRED
Advanced Ip Routing in Cisco Networks - Slattery and Burton ....
excellent book, but limited to IP routing
Jeff Doyle is highly recommended, but I did not touch it once.
Some FatKids labs, none of the commercial labs and a lot of the small
scenarios in all of the books... I reproduced them all. Ad nauseum!
Self created scenarios. All the labs in the ECP-1 and NMC-1...
BE PREPARED. DO NOT RUSH THE LAB DATE. I'd say 6 months before you try
it the first time. I spent 5 to 6 hours every night and all day Saturday
and Sunday for the three months before my lab date. There is no
substitute for hard work.
And for final plugs:
This mailing list is by far the greatest source of instant information
and FREE... a Bargain! Thanks Paul.
Also the iRC channel hosted by Geoff Zinderdine is the "hangout" for
those seeking instant gratification. See you guys in a few...
>From this list, I want to point out two people whose contributions
actually helped me a lot. Brian Dennis and Bob Sinclair. Thank you!
Many more deserve thanks... not enough time.
Okay, enough whining. Time to REST ZZzZZZzzzzzzzzzz
-- Manny Gonzalez.....................CCIE# 9013
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.4 : Thu Jun 13 2002 - 10:57:20 GMT-3