From: Fernando Carvalho (fernando.cagica@t-online.de)
Date: Mon Mar 03 2008 - 18:54:53 ARST
Congratulations!!!
Enjoy and rest a little bit.
-----Urspr|ngliche Nachricht-----
Von: nobody@groupstudy.com [mailto:nobody@groupstudy.com] Im Auftrag von Ed
Balow
Gesendet: Montag, 3. Mdrz 2008 18:56
An: ccielab@groupstudy.com
Betreff: Passed!! R&S #20152
Finally, I get to send out this email! I passed the R&S Lab in RTP on
Sunday,
March 3rd. I'm going to do a pretty lengthy email
simply because I liked to read them as encouragement while I was studying,
so I'm going to try to return the favor.
I've been working on the CCIE off and on for the past 10 years. I completed
the CCNA back in 1999 but was working primarily with servers at the time.
It wasn't until 2004 when I finished the CCNP. I began picking up home rack
equipment at the time and knocked out the CCIE Written. I also picked up
the IPExpert workbooks. I was just never able to put together a
regular study regiment and therefore never progressed.
Last year I became a father and my priorities changed a bit. Realizing
studying would likely get harder and harder, I knew I needed to get on the
ball. While my wife was expecting, I picked up the IE CoD and watched every
last minute of it. I also listened to the Audio CDs during my commute. The
material was excellent and really helped get me to the CCIE level of
understanding required for the lab. In September I then took the IPExpert
bootcamp with Marvin Greenlee. Monday through Wednesday went well. On the
Thursday lab I told Marvin, "On the bad side,
I'm painting myself into every corner the lab leads me into, but on the good
side I'm able to work my way out of it." Then after the Friday lab, I
realized I was nowhere near the level I needed to be. I even told Marvin I
feel worse now than I did before the class.
For those of you that think this is odd, let me assure you this was a
blessing. It is IMPOSSIBLE to get someone to the CCIE level in a week. The
bootcamp did three very important things. It was the first time I dedicated
8 continuous hours to a lab on a daily basis. It gave me immediate feedback
whenever I had a question on a task, instead of searching online to find the
answer when the DocCD just wasn't enough. Finally, it made me wake up and
understand I had a lot more to do before even considering attempting the
lab.
After the bootcamp, I did a full, relatively uninterrupted 8 hour IPexpert
lab
every weekend. Once January arrived I did an IE graded lab on
Saturday and a IPexpert lab on Sunday. I really cannot say enough about the
IE
graded labs. I had no idea how many little mistakes I was
making that I wasn't catching before that.
Within a month, my IE graded lab scores raised up to 65%. I took the first
lab attempt on January 25th. I walked out feeling I could have passed.
Unfortunately I wasn't even close. By looking back at my IE graded labs, I
realized how accurate they really were at gauging performance.
Naturally I was a bit bummed out I didn't make it the first time. Marvin
offered some words of encouragement and explained how close I really was.
He recommended I take the test the next month.
I continued doing IE graded labs on Saturday and IPexpert or IE workbook
labs on Sunday. On my last IE mock lab I scored over 90%. Of course all my
score report says is PASS, but I wouldn't be surprised if that was close to
what the actual score ended up being.
So what did I do differently between the 1st and 2nd attempt? The bottom
line is on the 2nd try I spent much more time on verification. No matter
how insignificant, I did another "show run" to ensure the config looked
right, and then the appropriate show commands to verify it "took".
Another major change is I used a single terminal window from the terminal
server on the first attempt. I went with 10 windows on the 2nd try. I
highly recommend 10 windows so you can see your debug and logging
messages on multiple devices on the same time. I was originally
worried of using more than 1 because I was afraid I'd get the windows mixed
up. Getting practice with multiple windows helped stop this from happening.
Another thing is I made a detailed Layer 2 diagram where I drew out every
single switch port. I also made a high level BGP diagram to draw every
adjacency. Last, I added multicast information to the Routing diagram to
help with visualization.
The bottom line is even though I knew the material well enough technically
the first time, I needed to do better planning and verification. I also
kept a picture of my son on the desk while I worked. Whenever I began to
feel drained he would inspire me to keep going.
Also on the first attempt I only asked a few questions. This time I must
have asked 20-30. I wasn't going to assume ANYTHING. The proctor, Tom, is
back from a one year hiatus of working at the lab. He's now proctoring on
weekends. He was always very patient and did a great job of
clarifying several questions for me. It only took him less than 2 hours to
grade the lab. So if any of you are worried about a grading delay on the
weekend, there isn't one.
A few of the materials used:
Routing TCP/IP (Doyle), especially Volume I was my favorite book for
actually learning the technologies in preparation for the written.
OSPF Network Design Solutions (Thomas), was an excellent OSPF resource both
for learning and reference InternetworkExpert Class on Demand, priceless for
bridging the gap between being "booksmart" on the materials and actually
being able to configure them. InternetworkExpert Labs, have the best
explanations and verification demonstrations IPExpert Labs, vague wording
really helped in preparations IPExpert 1 week bootcamp, very motivating and
filled in a lot of gaps CCIE Assessor, great for understanding the question
formats and how the labs are graded.
Groupstudy, I've been a passive reader for nearly a decade. Thanks for all
the tips and inspiration over the years.
And of course I have to thank my wife. I would never have been able to stay
focused, especially with a newborn at home, without her help and sacrifices.
Ed Balow
CCIE #20152
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