Re: FINALLY NAILED IT: #25510 is mine !!!

Congratulations! Keep us posted about any of your future endeavors

--
Regards,
Rick Mur
CCIE2 #21946 (R&S / Service Provider)
Sr. Support Engineer  IPexpert, Inc.
URL: http://www.IPexpert.com
On Fri, Sep 25, 2009 at 11:53 AM, Alexei Monastyrnyi
<alexeim73_at_gmail.com>wrote:
> Congrats and quite a nice number too! :-)
>
> A.
>
> mihai.grigore_at_onlinehome.de wrote:
>
>> Hi all,
>>
>> I was not posting too much here, I was reading more what others asked.
>> I just wanted to let you know that I passed the certification lab. Number
>> is
>> 25510, learned it this morning at 4:30AM local time. 4th attempt...
>>
>> I failed in January 2009 because I was simply too cautious and too slow,
>> not
>> that I did not know to answer the questions. I simply read all the
>> questions
>> many times, checked and re-checked and somehow, ran into a time management
>> issue, I did not have enough time to finish all tasks. But as you all
>> know,
>> this is part of the game and I failed this....
>>
>> Approximately 1,5 year back, me and a colleague of mine assembled a rack
>> in the
>> company premises and I can tell you this is the best solution for this
>> trip. I
>> used before the INE racks for 12 hours/day and this was hell. I had to
>> start at
>> 6:00AM local time untill 17:30. Now having the priviledge to have my "own"
>> rack
>> that I can access via VPN tunnel from anywhere, I had a lot of freedom to
>> work
>> whenever I wanted. I stopped counting how many weekends, vacation days,
>> etc I
>> spent on that rack. Probably my wife knows much better than me. But I
>> guess you
>> all know this by now...
>>
>> Back to my lab yesterday, in Brussels. I was the first one to arrive at
>> Cisco
>> location, only the security guy was there at 7:05 AM. We started the lab
>> at
>> 8:15 with the proctor. Very professional, nice guy. He was helpful in all
>> my
>> questions when I needed clarifications. And I can tell you I needed many
>> of
>> these clarifications. Do not be shy about this. You have doubts, just ask
>> politely for clarifications, NOT the solution.
>>
>> Open Ended questions were fair if you read the many recommended books,
>> there is
>> really nothing to worry about. I spent on them 10 minutes but checked them
>> 4
>> times in this period, just to be 100% sure. NO shortcuts here, as many
>> indicated in various posts...
>>
>> I moved to the configuration part. I got the Cisco diagrams that you MUST
>> re-draw yourself, as Scott Morris recommended so many times. Again, it was
>> my
>> (TCP) slow start. By lunch break at 11:50, I was half done with the IGP.
>> But
>> somehow was not worried, I knew I could do it.
>>
>> Lunch was just to get some calories into my body, I chatted with the
>> proctor
>> and other candidates a bit, took the chance to relax and reset from the
>> lab
>> stuff. It is very important, you cannot configure 8 hours without having a
>> break, your brain cannot stand it. At least mine cannot... I have seen
>> posts
>> here from people complaining about food quality in don't remember which
>> location. I was not interested in that at all, just get your brain some
>> calories, to be able to go on for the second round. Took some light fish
>> menu,
>> a drink and light desert. If I eat too much, I get sleepy afterwards, so
>> beware
>> of this.
>> Round two started at about 12:30 with still 4,5 hours to go. I knew I
>> could do
>> it. Naturally, I read through the whole lab at the beginning, but you get
>> the
>> small things (which are killing us) only when you actually configure the
>> various tasks.
>>
>> I used DOCCD 4-5 times, but I must say I knew exactly what and where to
>> look
>> for. Like Anthony Sequiera once told us, it took me 30 seconds to find
>> what I
>> wanted, the Ctrl+F to search for the keywords. It worked just fine. Be
>> sure to
>> know where is located what, it will save you time.
>> I walked away with a good feeling and this morning at 4:30 I could no
>> longer
>> sleep, opened the mail, my lab report was already available. Logged in
>> with
>> wrong credentials 3 times (what would you expect at 4:30AM ???) and at 4th
>> attempt, there it was: PASS. Wow, that was a big relief!!! I cannot
>> describe
>> it...  of course I was no longer able to sleep further...
>>
>> I noticed that many of the people that passed reported on GS a similar
>> behavior, learning the news at small hours in the night, not being able to
>> sleep. I guess you simply feel when you do good.
>>
>> Some years ago there was a movie "Doing time"...  I did my time, now it's
>> back
>> to normal life, family and friends again. I am now anjoying some drinks
>> right
>> now...
>>  For those still striving for it, I would recommend to do the ASET labs if
>> possible. These are available for Cisco partners through your Cisco SE.
>> There
>> are 15 mini-labs and 6 full labs. These are free of charge. I scheduled
>> about
>> 12 sessions, 10 hours each. You get to know the way how the questions are
>> asked, how topology diagrams are presented etc. I found particularly
>> interesting the reversed lab 6. You get the outputs and you need to
>> configure
>> in such a way to get those outputs. By doing this, I learned to check line
>> by
>> line and word by word. This way I could find some minor mistake in my
>> configuration in the lab and saved me some points.
>> John Galt Kupec is the person supporting the ASET labs and he was a great
>> help,
>> very responsive and professional when I indicated some issues. These were
>> addressed and corrected immediately.
>>
>> Besides that, I spent my last 6 weeks with the INE R&S WB Volume1 ver. 5.
>> It is
>> a great source of information, VERY well written, with lots of details and
>> clarifications that I have seen nowhere else. It helps immensely
>> understand how
>> things work. I cannot recommend it strongly enough!
>>
>> I was using mainly INE's materials and I would like to thank them for
>> their
>> materials and great instructors. Especially Scott, he was simply great
>> during
>> the boot camp last November in Reno!! Enjoyed both the style and
>> contents...
>>
>> I will mention again INE Vol1 version5. Peter's 400 pages CoS section (but
>> not
>> only) is simply amazing. Of course, I used all 3 volumes.
>>
>> Brians were also great instructors on the CoD. I still cannot understand
>> how
>> Brian Dennis can speak so fast for so long. I had to listen CoD 3 times in
>> order to get ALL the details they talk about.
>>
>> I learned also many interesting things on this GroupStudy, lots of
>> knowledge
>> here and many helpful people. Just put your question there, someone will
>> answer
>> you.
>> Of course, a lot of noise, like in any forum that I participated, but I
>> guess
>> this is human nature...
>>
>> All this helped me during my preparation. Thank you again and sorry if I
>> missed
>> anyone.
>>
>> Thank you for your patience to read this, hopefully it would help you too.
>> Wish
>> you all the luck with your preparations.
>>
>> NOW, you might think I am crazy, but I will still seriously ask this: HOW
>> DO
>> YOU KEEP YOURSELF UP TO DATE?
>> A colleague of mine has got his number more that one year ago and he has
>> to
>> re-certify soon. But with the blueprint 4.0 now. Naturally, I have some
>> ideas
>> but would like to hear yours.
>>
>> Best regards,
>>
>> Mihai Grigore
>> CCIE# 25510
>>
>>
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>>
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