My apologies for the length, but I have imagined writing this post for about a year now. I am sure it littered with typos - but now its too long to proof... Frequently while I was studying I would come to this section to get encouragement to continue on. So I pass along my story in the hopes that it will encourage you guys and gals out there working hard to obtain your CCIE. It’s a tough road - and that’s why its so rewarding. I said a ton here, but if anyone who is working on their IE has any questions feel free to ask. I am happy to try to help (short of breaking NDA of course).
tl;dr version
Passed the written in May of 2013. Started studying for the lab June of 2013. Did nothing but study, work, and sleep for 5 months. Attended the 2 week bootcamp in Orlando, FL in Nov. of 2013. Dave Smith is awesome. First attempt in Dec of 2013. Failed the troubleshooting because I did not stick to my strategy. Also failed the config section, but I think it had a lot to do with being upset from the t-shoot fail. Did more full scale Vol2’s, all Vol 3’s, Vol 1 review, 3 INE mock labs, and all 3 ine TS labs between attempt #1 and #2. Passed attempt #2 on March 6th of 2014 despite not having enough time to check everything over at the end (only got to check L2 and a little L3). Found out about the pass just as my second flight was taking off to get back home night of the lab. It hard to even describe how good it felt. I could not stop smiling.
Thanks and Praise
- I give all of the glory to God. I only went down this path because I (and my wife) felt he was calling me to. He organized a career change that enabled the opportunity (Its kind of crazy how I got my current job). He blessed me with an amazing wife who was incredible supportive, and a mind able to do it. He gave me strength when I was weak, surrounded us with a supportive community, and I tried as hard as I could to lean on him throughout all of this. Jesus is my savior and I owe everything, even a CCIE, to him.
- My wife – she is just a rockstar. To say that this last year was hard on me would be a disservice. It was every bit as hard for my wife (and maybe even more so). She spent a lot of nights alone because I was down stairs studying well past when she went to bed. She was always patient with me. She did everything she possibly could to support me. She was so understanding and encouraging. I know it was incredible hard for her to almost not have a husband for a year (especially with a toddler running around now). But she did it. This is just as much here CCIE as it is mine. I absolutely could not have done it without her.
- My boss and employer. They supported this effort in numerous ways– and I am extremely grateful. Especially thankful to my boss – he is the one who fought for me to have the opportunity, helped me scrounge up lab equipment, affording me time during work to study, and did everything he could to help.
- Many, many friend and family help us in numerous ways along the way. Many prayers were lifted for our family and that support was absolutely amazing. God has been very good to us and I am humbled by the people He has placed in our lives.
My advice to others
- Try to enjoy it. Trust me – I know how hard it is. I know all about the long hours, the late nights, the lack of sleep, and the frustration. Know that all of that is normal (for a CCIE that is) and you are going to have moments and days that are especially hard. But, if you enjoy networking - you should enjoy studying and learning about it to some degree. I loved learning all of the new stuff and did enjoy working on the routers and switches for much of my labbing. It gets old – trust me I know. But you should only be doing this if you honestly enjoy networking. If you don’t find it interesting and exciting ( or at least most of it) then I cannot imagine how you will be able to stick to it. Try to remember you once loved this stuff… ;)
- Set a study plan out form the get go – and stick to it. I based mine of Brian’s how to pass the CCIE post – but shortened it to fit my schedule (3 of his weeks in 1 of mine). Setting a schedule is critical to staying on track and getting to the end goal in time.
- I’m going to sound like a INE poster child here, but concentrate on the understanding the technologies. I got a little to caught up in just finishing whatever tasks I had assigned for a given week (even if I really still didn’t understand it). Take the time to play around with it. Watch the corresponding ATC videos – read the cisco docs. The things they throw at you in the exam aren’t hard if you understand the technologies. But, if you just know how to configure it a certain way (the right way…)– they will throw you for a loop. This is not a best practice test – it’s a test designed to prove you really understand the technologies.
- When you are doing your first run through Volume 1 – I have 2 recommendations. #1 – write down any task that was new or unfamiliar to you. For me that was A LOT of them. That will be a good list of things to revisit again when you can. #2 – I would recommend revisiting each chapter a week or two after your initial pass through it. You will be able to cover it much faster that second time – and it will help a ton with remembering it. So say you cover Chapter 1 on Week 1, and Chapter 2 on Week 2. On Week 3, cover chapter 3 and do Chapter 1 again (in total or just the ones you noted from recommendation #1). Then on Week 4 do chapter 4 and re-do chapter 2…. Etc. I found that I forgot a lot of the stuff a few weeks later. Spaced repetition is arguably the best way for our minds to learn (google the term – there is a well known computer program and learning method based on it that I researched a bit but, ironically, the name escapes me at the moment). The long and short of it – the best time to review something is just before you would have forgotten it. Flashcards can be awesome for this (check on Anki) – though I never managed to use them as much as I had hoped.
- Practice verification. It took me a long time to realized that being able to verify that you have configured something correct is just as important as know how to configure it in the first place. It is absolutely essential. Adopt the mantra that there are 2 pieces to every technology. Config and verification. The verification will save you tail when you forget a simple little thing. Pay attention to the commands they show you in the answers of Vol1 (and others). You should build the habbit of configure – verify – configure – verify…
- Start doing the Vol2 labs in a single sitting as soon as you are able. You wont be able to right away, but I found that the total time it took me to finish a lab dropped significantly once I carved out 8-10 hours to do it all at once. I know its hard to sacrifice and entire night/Saturday/Sunday – but I found it to be the best use of time. I was spending 5 nights (at 3 hrs each) on a Vol 2 and not finishing it. Once I switched to one sitting – I could do it in 8-10 hrs (and much less later on). When you break it up you forget what you did earlier, forget the environment/protocols/etc.
- Concentrate on the core stuff – and get really fast at it. Im talking about vlans, spanning tree, portchannels, ospf, eigrp, bgp (mpls is border-line). I remember Dave saying at the bootcamp that he can tell you 70% of the test without even breakint NDA – and giving that list (or similar). That stuff is always on there (from what I understand) so you better know it cold. And not just know it cold – but you should be extremely fast at it. Vol3’s are GREAT for this. I started doing a Vol 3 a week just to work on speed because that killed me on attempt #1. I knew the stuff, but I was not fast enough. I personally think the time recommendations in Vol 3 are too generous. I was doing most every task in Vol3’s in ½ the stated times – and still ran out of time on test day. (Part of that is because I was much more careful on test day which honestly was somewhat of a bad thing).
- On a similar note – I absolutely recommend notepad for two different purposes. #1 as you are learning, configuring in notepad instead of on the CLI will show you what you really do and do not know. If you can type out all of the commands from memory in the correct order w/o context help – that’s when you REALLY know that you know it. Now, you don’t need that level of familiar with every single command and technology. I absolutely used the ? on test day – but only for a few misc. commands and features. I did not use it for anything relating to the core configs mentioned above. The vast majority of it I knew off the top of my head. #2 -Now when it comes to test day – I only used notepad where it made sense. That is – any config that was repetitive. So if I had to apply a similar config to several devices – I used notepad. If not – I just did it in the command line. Use you full scale labs to test and work on this skill. Time yourself on Vol3’s especially and figure out the fastest way you can do it.
- Find a study buddy. Someone who is in a similar position to you in his or her studies – and who’s schedule is conducive to yours. You can learn a lot by studying together – and they will motivate/encourage/challenge you. Check out the “Back to the Grindstone” part for what my study buddy and I did.
- DO ALL OF THE INE GRADED TROUBLESHOOTING LABS. They are 30 tokens each – and it will be the best $90 you have ever spent unless you are already very experienced at troubleshooting 30 router environments. On attempt number one I was surprised at how overwhelming I found the troubleshooting section. I’m sorry to tell you, but the troubleshooting of the Vol 2’s, Vol 4’s, and Mock Labs is much easier than the real test. It actually may very well be the same problem you run into in the real test – but those troubleshooting sections tesnd to point you right to device the problem – Cisco is not so kind. You have to track down the problem router/switch. They are nice enough to highlight the portions of the topology for a given ticket, so you aren’t going to be looking at all 30– but I did find it was often more than a few. The INE graded TS labs, however, are a really good representation of the real thing (except 1 ticket in my opinion/experience). I really wish I had done these before attempt #1. I only have 2 complaints - #1 there aren’t more – I would have paid for every one. #2– all 3 use the same topology. I can understand why they did this (its a lot of work to setup 30 routers in a fully functioning network and then carefully select faults to inject), but by the 3rd lab I felt like I was pretty familiar with the network. Learning to quickly dive into an unfamiliar environment (ip addressing, interfaces, protocols, etc) is really important for the TS.
- Do a few mock labs. Unfortunately, I do not think that INE’s mock labs are quite as representative of the real test as the TS labs are – but they are still good. I would say that if you can afford it – do the 2 or 3 of the hardest ones towards the end of study. More-so to practice lab strategy, time management, and just simulate a test environment. To that end – turn of you phone – and disconnect from everything (other than INE and cisco’s site for docs). I would say the biggest difference from INE and the real deal is length. Say INE might have 3 bullets on a task – the real one will have 6 bullets and 1 will be something more obscure that you may or may not be familiar with.
- To that end – know the docs really well. You are allowed access to the configuration guides, command references, and master indexes. You should be intricately familiar with all 3. When you are doing you studying (especially for Vol2/3/4) – try to use the cisco doc first every time. If you absolutely can’t figure it out – then go to an outside resource to gain understanding. You may read some people who say “you don’t have time to use the docs during config/troubleshoot” I disagree. You do have time – but with 2 big caveats. #1– you can’t be looking up everything. You should only be checking the doc cd for a few things, tops. You definitely don’t have time to look up everything. #2 – you better know where to find things. Cisco’s documentation is notoriously amazing (sarcasm font?). What you do not have time to do it hunt around to find something. You should know exactly where to go depending on what you are looking for. Its easy for some topics (multicast, routing protocols, ipv6, etc). But ip services, network management, WAN, etc. can be a bit tougher to find. Also make sure you are really good at using the master index as that is a great way to find something quickly if you don’t know where it is (or can’t remember). And it seems obvious, but if there is something you are not as strong on – get especially good at navigating the docs for that technology.
- I recommend replicated the test environment as best as you can as you near your test date. Use a screen size the same or smaller than the testing centers (RTP was a single 22 or 23” at 1080 I think). Use windows xp (and VM works well) with putty and plain microsoft notepad (ick I know). Replicate the environment as much as possible. Small things (like using shift+insert to paste in putty) can get really frustrating on lab day if you have been doing it a different way for years. Also window management (since you aren’t going to have anything with tabs) is good to get down and used to. As a mac/secure crt/text mate user: XP, putty, and notepad frustrated me on the first attempt. I used a windows xp vm w/ plain notepad and putty for all of my Vol 2, Vol3, Mock labs, and troubleshooting labs after attempt #1. When I took attempt #2 – I felt much more at ease in the testing environment. The only thing I used secureCRT for (and OS X) was Vol1 stuff as I reviewed it. There the focus was on understanding everything about the technology – not speed/accuracy/and strategy like the Vol 2/3/ML/TS.
- I treated every Vol 2 I did on my second pass as a mock lab. I treated it like the real thing – no resources but Cisco docs. No random breaks. I did it w/o any cheating and tried to finish with at least an hr to spare so I could go back and check everything. Basically do your own mock lab. I used my XP vm, etc. Its no joke to crank out a full lab in 8 hours – and I can almost gurantee you wont be able to do it at first. Its like exercise honestly – you have to build up the endurance. Over time I got much much better at full scale labs. By doing it so many times I felt like I had taken 20 labs by the time I got to test day. I would always try to finish n, and only then, I would go back and “grade” it after I was all done.
- Take 1 day/night a week off. Prior to attempt number #1 I very rarely ever took a day/evening off. after attempt #1 I tried to take 1 night a week off. It helped immensely for me to not feel so burnt out. It was also a bit easier since I could cover more content a lot faster at the end since I wasn’t learning new things all the time. It was just polishing and refining. You may not need to/want to take a day off early on – and I would say ok. But sooner or later you probably need to start doing it or you are going to get burnt out.
- You will get there. I remember one of the INE videos I watched, the instructor was asked about the number of attempts it takes to pass. His response – who cares. He went on to say, that EVERYONE in this room or listening online would one day be a CCIE. Because if you are setting out on this journey – you know its going to be tough – yet you choose to do it anyway. The type of person who choses to do this is not a quitter. They will not suddenly decide its too hard one day and give up. They will keep working until they achieve their goal. I remembered that often while studying. I had no idea how long it would take, how many trips I would make to RTP, but I knew that I WOULD one day be a CCIE, because I wasn’t going to stop until I did. And you are the same way – I guarantee it. I think that takes a lot of pressure off (I know there is still a lot of pressure – believe me). I remember when I first began working through Volume 1, I thought there was absolutely no way I could ever know all of this. There were a lot of things I was seeing for the first time (or at least the first time in a long time – so it felt like the first time) and I would forget them just a week after learning it. Believe it or not – you will remember it all (and you will be amazed when I happens), but it takes time. Sorry to say, it takes a lot of time. That’s why it takes people months and years to get a CCIE – not weeks. Because of the sheer volume of material.
Test day recommendations
- #1 – nothing new on test day. I actually took this rule from when I ran a marathon. There should be no “firsts” on race day when you run a marathon. Don’t wear anything new (shoes, socks, shirt, shorts..), don’t eat anything new (the day before or for breakfast that morning). Nothing should be the first time for anything (except maybe running the full 26.2 mi). This is because you want everything to be practiced, tested, and familiar. If you wear new socks – you might find they rub your feet raw after 16 miles. New food might upset your stomach, etc. I applied the same theory to the lab exam. So if you are going to make your own L2 and L3 diagrams (I personally didn’t find it necessary either time) then you should do that every time you do a Vol 2 or Mock lab. Practice your “tracker” to know exactly what you are going to record on it, etc. And don’t eat anything funky the day before ;). Just practice exactly what you plan to do in the lab. Nothing should be “oh well I will do that on the real test.” If you will do it then – do it now. Practice, practice, practice.
- I think its ok to do some studying the day before – but certainly do not do anything like a mock lab/vol 2/vol 3/etc. You want to be fresh for test day. Just review some notes, videos, etc.
- Get a good nights rest – its not easy to fall asleep because you are so excited/nervous/anxious. Just try to remember you have worked hard to get here – and the best thing you can do now is rest. Again see my advice about not doing anything new, but if you have a tested and known way to ease to sleep that wont leave you groggy in the morning go for it (I find a beer very helpfulJ thoughtI choose not to do this)
- Bring snacks (or a full lunch) I cannot speak for other testing centers but the proctor in RTP allows you to bring in food and drink. Because lunch is so short (and I wasn’t all that hungry anyway) its nice to have some snacks to much on if you get hungry later. Some guys brought in full meals – that’s fine. If you like anything to drink other than sodas and water – bring it.
- Read the lab carefully, and understand what they are and are not requiring. It sounds silly, but don’t assume a requirement. I found that many of the restrictions that people often worry about (can you use a static mroute for instance) were clearly stated. And what they expected you to have in terms on connectivity was also clearly stated. Kudos to Cisco for that. I’m not saying its not tricky to read several tasks and reconcile them all together – it is. But some of the things you will see on the forums about is it allowed/isn’t it/etc. was actually pretty clear.
- I recommend a full read through of the lab when you start config. It helps you spot things they might be trying to hand you up in. And sometimes they throw something in late in the lab that impacts something you did early on, etc. So read the whole thing (this is a skill you need to practice). Also (and I forgot this on attempt #2) look for anything that would require you to reboot a device (2 particular things on a switch require a reboot to take effect….). You want to catch that all and do it right away (or early on when its convenient cause you aren’t going to need that device). You don’t want to be wasting time waiting for devices to reboot multiple times…
Good luck to everyone out here working. Its hard but you will get there.
Now the $10,000 question – was it all worth it? Honestly, I don’t know yet. I think the answer will be yes – but time will tell. I am not going to say that’s an easy call, I basically traded a year of my life – a year of time with my wife and daughter (who will never be this little again) for this cert. So I am not going to say it was worth it until I see that evidence – but I will say it feels great! And I now finally use the gift INE gave me :)
Yeah I am from Wisconsin :)
And here is the long version if anyone is interested…
The Beginnings
I actually began in the field of network engineering and my Cisco training in high school. My high school had a program that paid the tuition fees for students to take a night class at a local technical college (which was the Cisco CCNA course). I did that for 4 hours every Tuesday night for the last two years of high school (though I did not actually get my CCNA certification until later)– and decided that I wanted to do networking as a career. I selected a college that had an Information Technology Management program that was based on the Cisco CCNA and CCNP curriculum primary. Because of the classes I took during high school I was able to test out of the CCNA course (and get the credits for it!). At the time the CCNP was still a 4 part test – which was covered in 4 different semesters at school. I passed each of the first 3 exams and as the 4th was drawing near, I had to finally get around to passing the CCNA so I could actually get the CCNP. I finally took my CCNA just a few weeks before I took the 4th and finally CCNP exam. I graduated with both J. At the time I was absolutely ecstatic to have my CCNP and remember I felt like the king of the world. My peers and I occasionally chatted about the CCIE – but I honestly don’t know if I ever thought I would do it.
Fast-forward a few years and the CCIE had come up every once and a while, and my wife and I had talked about it several times. I had two good college friends who now held the R/S, but I really wasn’t so sure I wanted to go for it. Around two years ago, I got an exciting new position at a Cisco gold partner/ISP with the possibility of them supporting a CCIE. My wife and I had our first child and I quickly realized that if I wanted to ever get the IE – now was the time. The time sacrifice is immense, and I knew I didn’t want to sacrifice the time with my family later. At least while my daughter was little (less than a year)– she really wouldn’t realize that I wasn’t around because I was studying all the time. So I talked to my boss and after a bit of magic on his side the stage was set for me to begin the journey. Both of the friends had used INE for their training, and spoke very highly of it. I knew right away that’s the route I wanted to go, and so I got the bundle deal with two years access, a 2 week bootcamp, and the first exam fee covered. I passed the written on May 23, 2013 and after a nice vacation, and a few weeks to get everything in order – began studying for the lab around July 4th of 2013.
The Schedule
I knew I wanted to make the journey to the CCIE and quick as possible. I would rather sacrifice more for a short time, to get it done. So I choose a 5-6 month time frame for my first test – with the explicit goal of passing on my first attempt. I took the studying plan that Brian Dennis laid out in this blog post, but I adapted it to fit my schedule. Basically I put 3 weeks of his schedule into 1 week on mine. Since I work for an ISP, I was lucky enough to have a ton of old equipment at my disposal for my lab. I was able to set it up in the office w/ 24x7 vpn access. All 2800’s except my FRS which was a 3600. 2 3650’s and 2 3550’s. This means I did not have to do any rack rentals,I could work whenever I wanted, and things were always just as I had left them. This was a huge plus. For version 5 – the CSR would probably be great – except you cannot do any type of serial links (but there is no more FR on v5 – so not such a big deal. Afterall you can practice ppp features with PPPoE). I really hope Cisco gets VIRL out into the wild soon for v5 candidates. That seems like the best way to go.
It was incredibly difficult to get through the volume 1 material on my schedule the first time. It had been years since I had done the CCNP, and most of the content on the blueprint was not technologies I had not worked with since then. So it was like starting over in a lot of ways. I put in A LOT of hours each week to get through the content (well over 40). Thankfully my boss was very gracious and gave me one (and at times even more) day a week to use for studying. After I finished up volume one I remember attempted my first Volume 2 full scale lab. It was a train wreck. I can’t even tell you how long it took – but it was a LOOONG time. I remember thinking I would absolutely never be able to do this. But I kept my head down and every time I felt like I would never get there – I tried to remember how far I had already come and that I still had a lot of study time left. I continued on according to the schedule and worked hard to stay to it.
To say that its hard to study that much, for that long, is an understatement. I slept a lot less than I am accustomed to (which is not the best for learning…) and literally did nothing but work, study, sleep, and spend a few hours with my wife and daughter each day - For 5 months straight. I studied anywhere from 30-50+ hours a week (probably ~40-45 in a typical week). A few times my wife and daughter even went back home to her parents for a week at a time. On those weeks I did nothing but work and study around the clock. My usually schedule was to study every night from 8pm-11pm after we put my daughter to bed. I studied all day on Friday’s and for the last month or so Tuesday’s as well. On Satuday’s I got up earlier (6am) and put in an 8 or longer hour day, and then again from 8-11 at night. On Sunday’s I got up at 6 again and studied until about 9 am, and then we went to church. I would study any time my daughter napped (usually 2-3 hrs total) and again at night. I did not take any days off. (I changed this later). I also watched ATC videos (on 1.5x speed using VLC) during my lunch hour at work. About half way though Vol2, I realized that it was much better to do an entire Vol2 lab in 1 sitting. It sounds simple, but I just couldn’t do that early on. Once I made that jump – I found things went much better. I lost a lot of time trying to remember where I was, what I had already done, how the environment was laid out, and then generally forgetting something I had done in section 1 by the time I got to security 2-3 days later. Not at first, but I strongly advice working towards setting aside an 8-10 hr (it will take even less time later on) chunk of time for you full scale labs. Its way more effective than doing that same lab in 4 3hr chunks.
I planned my schedule so that I finished Brian’s entire plan before attending my bootcamp in Orlando, FL in November of 2013. Along the way I fell behind schedule a lot, but I always managed to claw my way back onto the schedule. I managed to finish Brian’s plan exactly when I planned and headed to the bootcamp a week later.
The Bootcamp
I had Dave Smith as my instructor, and to be honest, I was pretty disappointed when I found out my instructor’s name was not Brian something. But, I was very happy to learn that my disappointment was unfounded. Dave was a great instructor. He really knew his stuff well, and was not afraid to dig into anything we asked about, and he was just a nice guy. Fun to talk to and engaging I his teaching. He did a great job of not just showing us what works, but instead walking us right into problems and helping us understand why it doesn’t work. Once you understand that, fixing it is easy. So overall, the bootcamp was excellent. I learned quite a few things, solidified my understanding of some others, and built a bit of confidence on a number of things I already knew. I would recommend the bootcamp to anyone in a heartbeat, but as you will read elsewhere– go to the bootcamp when you are 90% done studying. It is not the place to be learning these things for the first time. There is simply too much content, and too much depth, to pick it all up from scratch. Its like drinking from a fire hydrant. The bootcamp is for polishing the skills and understanding that you have already built, pointing out some things you didn’t know that you didn’t know, and nailing down those 3 to 4 things you never quite got a handle on. Also, I recommend getting to know some of the other students there. Its great to make some friends, and you may find someone you can study with regularly (something I did later…) Plus, who knows, maybe they will be a future colleague :)
After going back home, I had 3 weeks until my first attempt. I began to go through the Volume 2 labs again (made it through the first 9) as well as doing some misc. review of Volume 1 content that I did not feel as strong on.
Attempt #1 – Dec. 2013
I sat my first lab attempt in RTP on Dec 9th. I flew in the afternoon before, rented a car, and stayed at the local Country Inn. The evening before the lab I drove to the testing center to make sure I knew just where to go, and there was no added stress or complication of getting lost in the morning. One suggestion, if you drive – avoid the tollway. I did not realize that they just snap a picture of the license plate and send you the bill in the mail. Awesome if you live there, or are at least in your own car, not so much in a rental. I had to go back after the fact and buy 1 days worth of toll way coverage because I went through a single toll. That 1 toll was $20. Just choose the “avoid tolls” option in google maps and you can take one of several routes to get there without the tolls (and it took 1-3 minutes longer max).
Some have suggested no studying what-so-ever the day before the exam. I just couldn’t do that. I did however avoid the CLI completely. I also avoided any full scale labbing two days before as well (you don’t want to have another lab fresh in your memory during the test!). I spent the time traveling on the plane and in the hotel room that evening watching some of the ATC videos on topics I wanted more of a refresher on and looking over notes of mine – specifically from the bootcamp.
When test morning came I got up and ran on the treadmill for a bit to get alert and wake up (And studies have shown anaerobic exercise before a test boosts scores – so it cant hurt!) I showered, spent time reading my Bible and praying, and then logged into my personal rack for a bit just to do some ‘warm up’. I just did some layer 2 switchport commands, basic routing etc. Just for a few minutes to sort of get out some of jitters and warm up the fingers. I grabbed breakfast in the lobby and headed to the exam.
As you will read from others, it seems the proctor is never there when the email/site says they will be. I don’t know if it’s a psychological game or what – but they seem to like to be late. I wouldn’t suggest counting on it and showing up late though… The one plus is that there is a restroom in the RTP lobby (assuming a Cisco employee was there to let you in). Take care of that before the proctor comes – Of course you can use the restroom during the exam but it costs you previous time. Especially during the t-shoot section.
I personally found the proctor at RTP, David, to be a very nice guy. He completely understood that people were nervous, and did his best to lighten the mood a bit and explain things clearly and simply. He tries to relax you a bit while explaining all of the rules etc. When it came to exam time, I found him much less helpful than I had hoped. That’s not a comment on David, but rather the role of the proctor. He will tell you that he can do exactly 2 things – 1. Fix hardware problems (you have to diagnose them) and 2. Answer CLARIFYING questions. The latter was my gripe. His definition of clarifying and mine are not the same – but again I really don’t blame David. He was very kind, and patient – there is just really very little he is allowed to say. Some of the things I though he should have been able to provide clarity on (because I felt the requirements could be interpreted two different ways) – he was unable to do so. But that’s not to say you shouldn’t try. My best recommendation for the proctor is to be clear in what you are asking – and understand he cannot tell you what to do – just provide some clarification on something that is not clear in the exam itself.
I began that test honestly believe I could pass. I have heard others say they had no expectations of passing the first try– not me. Your attitude is immensely important, and if you don’t think you can pass – you most likely will not pass. So I had every aspiration of passing. That aspiration was shattered after just two hours.
Yep – I failed the Tshoot and I knew it. I had not solved enough questions (you must solve 8 of 10 tickets). Side note: Be careful with this though. When I was there, one of the other gentlemen taking the exam explained that in a prior attempt he had thought he failed troubleshoot – and so he did not give config 100% of his effort. When he got the results, he had in fact passed troubleshoot – and wasted his opportunity. So absolutely keep score, but be very careful with the assumption that you failed. Overall, I found the unfamiliar environment and sheer number of devices slowed me down a lot. It took me a bit to get a feel for how they presented the information. In a few instances, I failed to completely understand the problem before trying to troubleshoot it – and wasted several minutes chasing the wrong thing. They will give you several diagrams besides just the big one. Take note of those. Sometimes the question will reference a diagram – sometimes it wont. They may or may not be helpful in understanding a given ticket.
My problem was 100% strategy. You have 10 trouble tickets, and 120 minutes to solve them. I knew this going in, and as I had read 100 times – most people recommend spending a max of 10 minutes per ticket. That’s 100 of your 120 minutes. You will lose a bit of time to reading instructions as well. I read through all 10 tickets first, then started at number 1 and worked away. Personally, after this attempt, I decided that reading all 10 tickets was a waste of precious time. I started out ok – solving a few tickets in order. A few took me a bit over 10 minutes – but I knew I was close to a solution so I wrapped it up in an extra 2-3 minutes. Then I hit my first 3 pointer – and that’s where I fell apart. It was a tricky ticket – but because I had read ahead I knew what the other 3 pointer was and I felt I had a better chance of solving this one (you can’t skip both 3 pointers and pass). So 10 minutes came and went – and it was not solved yet. But I thought I was close. Since I thought I had to solve this ticket – I kept going. As it turned out I was not as close as I thought. Before I knew it 30 minutes had passed and I still had not solved it. I finally moved on after killing 25% of my total time on 1 ticket! This is when I realized that I was probably going to fail. It was a tough thought to get out of my mind, but I tried to move forward. The next ticket was the other 3 pointer, and I solved it - in under 10 minutes! I kept moving and with 15 minutes left – had solved 6 (including 1 of 3 pointers). There were 3 tickets left. I spent 10 minutes on #8 – and at that point decided I couldn’t possibly solve one in 5 so continued on with the current ticket. In retrospect – I may have still been able to get it had I skipped #8 (which I knew was not one of my strongest areas) and tried #9 and #10. When time expired (it’s a hard stop on the t-shoot by the way) I had solved 6 and never even looked at 2 tickets. I speak from experience – if you cannot get it in 10 minute (or feel after 5 or 6 that you have no idea) MOVE ON! You don’t have to solve them all – and don’t assume the next ticket will be just as hard. Frankly – some of they were so easy I spent a lot of time second guessing if that could really be all it was.
Knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that I had failed – I tried to move onto the config section and forget about that – but its hard. I was pretty flustered (especially because it was a strategy mistake and that I had known better). I did my best to use the opportunity to take the rest of the exam and realistically as I could. That way I could assess my readiness for the next attempt.
Config – I found the lab to be a good deal longer than INE’s. Reading it through to begin with took me 30 minutes! (way too long! Something I worked on for #2). Without going into detail – I would best describe it as a Vol 2 and Vol 3 lab combined. There was very little to no pre-config on my device (most of the pre-config was just there to cause problems).
I goofed up several VERY VERY basic configurations because I was not in the right frame of mind after failing TS. I interpreted the requirement correctly, and knew what I needed to do, then did something different. That killed a ton of time. Additionally, they threw in a nice pre-config that caused issues once you started configuring that killed a bunch of time. Had I just taken two seconds to check before I configured – I would have saved a lot of time (a habit I developed prior to attempt #2). I am not suggesting doing a full show run on all 9 devices – just look at the relevant area of the config before you get to work. I made several other silly mistakes through the lab. Some of which I realized later – and had to go back and fix. I attribute most of this to being upset – but I still determined it to be a weakness to address. During lunch (which is very quick btw. forget about being polite and letting everyone else go first – get your food and eat fast!) I chatted with a few other candidates. I found another guy who had the same situation as me – he had failed the tshoot and knew it. After the test we traded contact info and we ended up studying together quite a bit over the next few months. More on that in a minute. During lunch I knew I was not far enough along in the lab.
After lunch I got back to it. I hit a number of snags (some of which I still don’t know why I had trouble – it should have worked) and it just killed a bunch of time. It seemed like nothing would work how it should. I was unable to finish the entire lab – let alone verify. So I walked out feeling completely beaten. The positive takeaway was that there were only 2-3 things they asked for on the lab that I was not 100% certain how to do. I really felt that from a technical standpoint – I was in a pretty good spot. But my strategy had failed me in t-shoot, and I was not fast enough on config, especially with the basic setup of L2, l3, etc. To be honest – the lab was not nearly as tricky as I expected it to be. It was actually more straight-forward than I expected. My big take aways were to practice troubleshooting much more, and get much faster at the core stuff. I had 2 flights to get home, when I landed on the second one (at home) I got the email that my score report was ready. Knowing what it said (but secretly hoping for a miracle) I logged in and saw the official Fail. When I did the math the good news was I scored exactly as I thought on the TS (meaning all 6 tickets I thought I had gotten - I did get). I scored lower on config that I had expected– but also realized there were a few major sections that I never got working so…
Back to the grindstone
I immediately began working on scheduling a new date. Since the v5 update had been announce a few weeks before my exam, I was very nervous about dates filling up. I studied a bit for the holidays, but was busy like everyone else. Once Christmas was over, I started hitting it hard again. I connected with the friend I made during first attempt (coincidentally I choose the same date as he did for test #2 – it was a pretty logical choice with the options available at the time). We studied together pretty regularly for a while. We just used Google hangouts to screen sharing and have audio. We would each work away on our own – often on the same thing. Then we would work on something together when one of us needed help or hit a weird issue. I found it really helpful for a number of reasons. #1 – He taught me things I did not know and vice-versa. #2 – he hit issues that I did not (and vice versa), and working though them resulted in both of us having a better understanding. #3 it was nice to have someone else who understood just how hard this was. Not just in terms of the test being hard, but how hard it was to spend 30-40+ hours a week studying and the toll it took on your family life, sleep, etc. We commiserated on occasion. #4 It kept me on track with studying. On the week nights it was particularly easy to find myself side tracked and not studying when I should have been. Having someone else there forced me to stay on track – a huge benefit. Its way to easy to justify a “10 minute” studying break that takes far longer.
I made some changes to my studying schedule. The biggest thing was adding a night off – Friday nights. That, and I shortened my Saturdays to be done by around noon (or 1). Those to things made my studying a lot more family friendly. It was still hard – no doubt – but not nearly as tough as it was before. My wife was always very understanding, but she liked the new schedule a lot better.
I did 1 Vol3 lab each Saturday (the recent updates were very good other than the IPv6 sections – which are just flat out incomplete…). I did a Vol2 on Tuesday and Friday (usually) and covered volume 1 stuff in the 3 hr evening study sessions. It worked very well, and I was able to revisit all of Vol 3 again, and finished a 2nd trip through Vol 2. I also covered a good deal of Vol1 again (focusing on my weak areas of course).
Personal life got sort of crazy the week before my 2nd attempt, so I actually did very little studying that last week or so before #2.
Attempt #2.
I again went to RTP. This time I arrived earlier the day before (just because of flight times), rented a car, and went to the Country Inn again. Again I couldn’t not study – so I watched ATC videos on the plane, in the airport terminal, and in my hotel room as well as again reviewing notes. I met up with my study buddy for dinner since he was also testing the next day. I got back to my room, facetimed with my daughter and wife and hit the hay early (before 10). I followed the same routine in the morning – short run on the treadmill, shower, Bible & prayer, a few minutes to warm up on the CLI, breakfast and off to the testing center with a stop to get some tarbucks on the way this time J (yes you can take drinks in).
This time I was much more relaxed. My study buddy and I joked and talked while waiting for the proctor (yep behind schedule again…) Used the restroom and he finally showed up ;). He gave his scpeel and before I knew it, it was go time. This time I grabbed a water and earplugs (provided) before sitting down and got straight to work once the proctor let us go. The previous attempt I stalled for a few minutes before starting. With TS you get 2 hrs from the moment you click start – period. But, you all end at the same time at 4pm – so you actually are best of just getting to it – any time you stall is time off the back side of config.
TS went much better. First, I didn’t bother to read all tickets first. I knew I was going to at least attempt all 10 – so readying them ahead was just a wast of time in my opinon. My first ticket took 11 or 12 minutes, but then I hit my stride. Its hard to completely describe, but I just felt much more relaxed (its still stressful, but at least it was more familiar after attempt #1 and the INE TS labs). I got to the first 3 pointer, and had it partially solved in 10 minutes. I went a few more minutes and then moved on w/o solving it. Same story on the second 3 pointer. I moved on, and was able to knock out all of the other tickets pretty fast. I had over 20 minutes left w/ the two 3 pointers yet to go. I went back to the first one and after a few minutes I found it J I was so relieved. I spent the rest of the time verifying some of the other tickets I had made notes on to check, and trying to get that last ticket a bit. I never did solve that last one – but I knew it didn’t matter.
I moved on to config certainly feeling much, much better. I again read through the config – but for some reason decided to make a more detailed tracker then I ever had during my practice or previous attempt (a mistake). It ended up being a waste of time. See my advice about nothing new on test day… Thankfully this didn’t ultimately bite me. The good news was, I felt I had a much better handle on the lab as a whole after I finished my initial read through, and I caught 1 thing that was later in the lab that could be taken into account early on to save from potential mistakes (The read through took 30 min again – because of the tracker thing I did). Again I did not make a layer 2 or 3 diagram – because I didn’t see it to be necessary. Unfortunately by lunch I was still only working through my layer 2 (almost done) – so I was a bit nervous. I wanted to be much further. I lost a bunch of time on a very minor hiccup that had some pretty significant implications, and was actually very close to putting in a work around and moving on when I realized my [stupid] mistake. I was the first one to get food this time and didn’t even try to eat much for lunch. I choose to stand in the break room instead of the little room where it’s served since I wanted to stretch my legs. I made sure to get a restroom trip in during lunch since I was “off the clock” and in no time I was back at it. I finished up layer 2 pretty quickly and moved on to layer 3, etc. I was definitely behind my desired schedule – but I tried to work fast and accurately knowing I would probably not have time to verify it all again (especially as it got to 2 and 3 o’clock). I finished every item on the lab w/ just 20-25 minutes left. I had always practiced rebooting my devices prior to the final verifications (some issues wont present themselves until you reboot). With only 20 minutes I decided that was out of the question. That time was too precious to be spent waiting for them to boot. But I was fairly confident that I didn’t have any of those issues. I set to work verifying as quickly as I could (see my tip about how its critical to practive verification – I got a lot of verification done in 20 minutes, because I had done it a lot in practice). I knew exactly what commands to use to check things – and in many instances I had specific | inc | ex or | sec that I used to trim down on output to save even more time. I did make a few minor changes – I will never know if they were necessary or not. Its possible that little verification and tweak was the different between a pass and fail. I made it part way through layer 3 stuff when the proctor came in and said time is up, save your configs and shut down.
I walked out really up uncretain. There were several items that were pretty significant on the lab that I was not 100% sure how they wanted it. I read the tasks several times, and understood that there were 2 ways to do it. In my mind how to do it depended on how you interpreted some of the wordings. Again, David is a very nice guy, and was very patient with me, but he was not able to help me in the way I had hoped. I was very nervous about these things because they were pretty significant points. Also, one of the things that you assume is always a requirement for the lab, wasn’t – and that freaked me out. I was really unsure about it – even though it was clearly stated, it made me really, really nervous.
I text my wife and told her it was a“maybe.” Without being able to check everything over, and the few things I was still really unsure about – I didn’t feel confident that it was a pass. My flight was at 5:55 so I had to rush to return my car and get to the airport. I checked my email (and refreshed the ccie portal page) many times – but no results before I took off for my first flight. I had a short flight to Charlotte to connect to my final destination. As soon as we landed I pulled out my phone and checked – nothing. I had to hurry to my next flight (the first flight was delayed and my connector was leaving in 15 mintues – good thing Charlotte is small!). I wishfully refreshed the portal page multiple times (even though I had not gotten the “score is posted” email – to no avail. I finally conceded I would need to wait another 2 hours until I landed at home and put it in airplane mode. I had started taking notes on my first flight about what I was asked to configure and what the network looked like. I started working on that again and the more I wrote down, the more convinced I was that I had not passed. I kept thinking of things I might not have done – or something different I could have done. I began preparing myself for the dreaded fail.
We ended up sitting on the runway for a bit and I got impatient. So as we were just about to take off I quickly took my phone out of airplane mode and immediately the banner popped that I had a score report email… And that’s when my heart started racing like everyone describes. I pulled up the page and was in such a hurry to look in the bottom right for the score, that I completely overlooked the big green check mark that said “Your CCIE status is Certified ( CCIE# 42713 )” next to it… Instead, once I had scrolled to the “Past lab Exams, there it was, “Status: Pass”. I couldn’t believe it. At this point the plane was literally taking off. I text my wife and a few others as fast as I could – went back and looked at the page again to make sure I really saw what I thought I did and went back to airplane mode. I am pretty certain I broke federal regulations – but until I get prosecuted I will say it was worth it J. Because I was on a plane I managed to hold in my excited yell (I really didn’t want to get hauled off by an air marshal as a terrorist suspect), but I could not stop smiling. I am sure the people next to me thought I was crazy. I was almost crying I was so relieved.
When I landed at home, and turned on my phone it when nuts! The
people I had txt had responded, and many congratulations started pouring in
from people my wife had told. I refreshed the page 5 or 6 more times to make
sure it was real. Unfortuantely, Instructor Dave told a story about a guy who’s
score got mixed up once, and they put that he passed, had to tell him while
later he failed. That whole story still haunts me. I would say I visit the page
at least once a day to look at my number (and my sure its still there 
).
It feels amazing. I am very grateful for the materials that INE has. Its not perfect – and I have my gripes- but on the whole its good stuff.
So now what?
Well I am going to spend some much needed time with my wife and daughter. They have been getting the short end of the stick for far to long – and they deserve better. I may someday pursue another (SP or DC) but for now – I am just going relax, spend time with those I love, and enjoy it.
It was long – but that’s my story
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-Mike Marx, CCIE #42713