Re: I PASSED! CCIE 25526! Another One for the UK!

Andrew,

Good story man!

COngratulations you passed the exam and also a good thing it was your
irst attempt!

-- 
Regards,
Iwan Hoogendoorn
CCIE #13084 (R&S / Security / SP)
Sr. Support Engineer  IPexpert, Inc.
URL: http://www.IPexpert.com
On Wed, Sep 30, 2009 at 1:46 PM, Andrew Forest <andrew.forest_at_gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> I Just wanted to let you know I passed my CCIE R&S lab exam on my first
> attempt last week in Brussels.
>
>
> I have been a silent reader of GS for over one year now, this is my first
> post, but I'm sure it won't be my last ;-)
>
> I started my cisco education out when I attended CCNA evening courses at my
> local college. I knew from then I wanted to make it to ccie level. I worked
> hard through my course, really enjoying it and finished with a nice mock
> CCNA lab. From leaving college I didn't touch another cisco router until
> about 2 years later, when i bought my first cisco 2600.
>
> I bought the router because of the fact I had forgotten everything I learnt
> in college, and still hadn't attempted my CCNA exam. So 1 router grew into
> 2, and a couple of 2950's were added to the mix. After studying on my home
> lab, I eventually passed the CCNA exam in August 2006, 4 years after the
> college course.
>
> At which point, I went out and got myself a new job. With one of the first
> things to do when starting the job was to gain CCDA certification.
> Still feeling good from my CCNA pass, I went ahead with the CCDA and passed
> in November 2006.
>
> From then on I stared working my way though CCNP books, one at a time. My
> lab at home grew bigger, my Dad found me 2 X 3640 routers and by some
> strange luck 3 X 2500 routers as well. Strange things some people throw out!
> These all helped me get though the 4 CCNP exams, with the BSCI being the
> hardest. I ended up gaining my CCNP in August 2007.
>
> Next, I went for the CCDP certification. My manager had expressed interest
> in the cert, so eager to impress, I went out and achieved that. Wasn't too
> bad after the CCNP exams!
>
> So, after all that I found myself sitting at home with my CCNP/DP and a half
> built rack of cisco equipment. I knew I wanted to go for CCIE, but just
> didn't have enough equipment to study on. So I started with the CCIE Written
> exam in December 2008, and passing March 2008.
>
> I looked into dynamips, for around a month or so, but found I was much
> happier using real equipment, so I decided to make the investment into my
> home rack.
>
> I went out and bought 2 X 3560's, 2 X 3550's, 4 x 2600XM's and a APC
> masterswitch, all from ebay. This took around 6 months to buy / build, and
> really cost me time when I should have been studying! But after the lab was
> fully built and I was able to access it from home / work / holiday I felt
> much happier. I think this is one of the key things to my success, to have
> unlimited access to your own equipment, without worrying about time or money
> was very important to me.
>
> In the meantime, I persuaded my manager to fund my first attempt in Brussels
> for September this year. I managed to book up just before the V4
> announcement was made. My written exam was due to expire late September, so
> I knew I was cutting it fine..
>
> I started out on Internetwork experts VOL1 (V5) Workbooks, man what a shock!
> The depth and detail of these workbooks were really overwhelming, but i knew
> I had come too far to turn back now. I pressed ahead with VOL1, and finally
> finished them in August this year.
>
> I had just about run out of time, 3 weeks before lab day I started the INE
> VOLII workbooks. I found these labs showed up a lot of my mistakes, and I
> started to get worried. I also struggled to finish the labs in under 2 days!
> I took the time to try and work out the solutions without just looking at
> the answers. I made pages and pages of notes, which i took with me
> everywhere so I could read up whenever I couln't access my home lab.
>
> I also used 4 X 4 hour sessions on the cisco ASET labs, the week before my
> exam. I didn't have enough time to attempt the full scale labs so I just
> focused on the modular technology labs. (BGP/QoS/Redistribution) I found
> these were really good, slightly different wording / structure compared to
> INE Workbooks which were a real eye opener!
>
> So, I caught the eurostar from London St Pancras to Brussels on Tuesday last
> week. This worked out quite cheap (B#29 each way) but was shocked when I had
> to get a taxi from Brussels MIDI station to the hotel, costing 42 euros!
> Brussels MIDI is approx 11km from the cisco / hotels area. Looking back it
> may have been cheaper to fly into Brussels airport and catch the free
> shuttle bus to the hotels. So be warned!
>
> I didn't sleep much the first night, about 4-5 hours or so, waking up around
> 10am the next morning. I took this time to walk to the testing centre, be
> warned it is not the HUGE cisco building with the glowing sign on it, it is
> the building just behind that one. After finding the right building I
> confirmed all the details for the next day and went back to my hotel room to
> study.
>
> That night, I read through some more of the VOLII labs and refreshed my mind
> with Doyle's TCP/IP 1+2. I tried not to study too much as I was already
> feeling tired from the 2 weeks of solid revision and wanted to keep my
> energy for the big day.
>
>
> Lab Day,
>
> I woke up 5:30, took a shower and started my walk down to the testing
> centre. I arrived there at 7am, greeted by the security guard. I was the
> first one there. Other candidates arrivied about half an hour later, no-one
> really talking, just sitting nervously sipping coffee. 8am, Bruno the
> proctor made an appearance, he welcomed us and escorted us up to the testing
> rooms. I asked if it was ok to bring in a couple of cans of energy drink
> into the exam, he was fine with it.
>
> For those smokers out there, be warned you can only smoke during lunchtime.
> Which was about half an hour anyway, so not much time to get your nicotine
> fix in! Fortunatley I wore a nicorette patch which helped me throughout the
> day.
>
> OEQ's were first on the list, which I took around 15 minutes to answer them,
> after checking them 5 times of course! Again, you've heard it here on the
> list, they are not to be feared. If you have read up on your books from
> Doyle / Odom then you will have no problems with this section.
>
> Lunch was very good! Large selection of Steak / Chips / Fish / Thai noodles.
> I went for the noodles, however I only took a couple of mouthfulls as I was
> so nervous. Chatted a little with the other candidates, all on their first
> attempts mostly doing R&S but there was a couple of voice / security
> candidates.
>
> I finished the lab around 3:30pm with about 1hr and half to go back and
> check my work. Good thing I did as I found 2 mistakes the second time
> around, worked through them and corrected them as best I could. The last
> hour was probably the worst part as all of the self doubt came into play and
> I started questioning my solutions. I carried on tweaking until about 30mins
> before exam end time, with a couple of things bothering me but didn't want
> to make any major changes this late in the day and just decided to leave
> them as is.
>
>
> I left the lab with a good feeling, I knew I'd given it my best shot and
> felt thouroughly exhausted. I met one of the candidates outside that wasn't
> looking too good. He told me he felt it didn't go well and he was on his 9th
> attempt at the voice track. I was shocked, I couldn't believe that it could
> take someone 9 attempts to pass the lab. From then on, my self doubt grew
> and grew...
>
> On the train ride home, (another 54 euros) taxi ride to the station, I went
> through the lab over and over in my head. I realised I had forgotten some
> stupid commands. And started counting up the points that I thought I'd
> missed.
>
> I arrived back in the UK around 9pm and made it home for around 10. Checked
> my email, no score report. So I cracked open a bottle of cider I had saved
> for my return.
>
> Midnight came, still no score report. Me and my girlfriend were both
> watching my laptop screen waiting for the email to come in. I didn't feel
> good. Then at 12:30 the email came through, I logged in and checked and it
> was a PASS!!!
>
> Thank god! I didn't really know how to react, I checked it over and over
> just to be sure, but when I saw my number I knew it was real!
>
>
> So just to recap, the study methods I used to gain CCIE R&S were:
>
>
>   - Internetwork Expert Workbooks VOL1+2
>   - Internetwork Expert COD
>   - Internetwork Expert Audio Class
>   - IPExpert's RS Quizzer
>   - Jared Scrivener's free CCIE vLecture COD's
>   http://www.ipexpert.com/index.cfm/a/p/vlectures
>   - Cisco ASET modular Labs
>   - Doyle's TCP/IP VOL1+2
>   - Odom's, R&S Certification Guide
>   - Krzysztof ZaE D ski's Quick Review Kit http://inetcon.org/blog/
>   - Jeremy Cioara's CBT Nuggets (Old but still relevant)
>   - GroupStudy
>   - + Many blogs / websites / forums I found online..
>
>
> I wanted to thank everyone for contributing to this list, this has been one
> of the best resources I have found for CCIE certification online. Before I
> found groupstudy CCIE felt like a lonely journey, until I found all of you!
>
> I want to thank all the instructors out there, 2 X Brians, Scott Morris,
> Anthony Sequeira, Narbik and of course Paul Borghese for keeping this list
> running.
>
> Kind Regards,
>
> Andrew Forest
> CCIE# 25526
>
>
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>
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-- 
Regards,
Iwan Hoogendoorn
CCIE #13084 (R&S / Security / SP)
Sr. Support Engineer  IPexpert, Inc.
URL: http://www.IPexpert.com
Blogs and organic groups at http://www.ccie.net