Passed v5 written - my thoughts

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Comments

  • PsychoFinPsychoFin Member Posts: 280
    Gotta hurry up with those SPv3 boot camps before they change to v4 :)
  • gorebrushgorebrush Member Posts: 2,743 ■■■■■■■□□□
    Yeah NAT might be just one subsection, but have you considered situations such as NAT and DMVPN? I've not covered this yet but I believe there are one or two out there that are not sure about it.
  • Alex90Alex90 Member Posts: 289
    lrb wrote: »
    Yep you get your number straight away - 45527! It's a frantic heart-in-mouth moment between the time when you get your email titled "score report" (which really has nothing in it) to when you actually see the result in the CCIE login.

    That's really cool mate :) I hope to one day have this same feeling! I suppose it's hard to say but, on average how many hours of study were you putting in per week and over what period of time? Did you attand a bootcamp or anything as well?
  • KelkinKelkin Member Posts: 261 ■■■□□□□□□□
    Congrats! Definitely got me more motivated :)
  • Lucas21Lucas21 Member Posts: 46 ■■□□□□□□□□
    gorebrush wrote: »
    Yeah NAT might be just one subsection, but have you considered situations such as NAT and DMVPN? I've not covered this yet but I believe there are one or two out there that are not sure about it.

    Sure NAT and DMVPN and NAT with other protocols. But he was hammering NAT from every angle for weeks it seemed :D
  • lrblrb Member Posts: 526
    Lucas21 wrote: »
    There was one thing that I wanted to ask you for a little while now but didn't want to disrupt your study process. It is that you seemed to cover NAT above and beyond what seems necessary. I looked at the blueprint - both official and expanded INE - and NAT is just one subsection.

    Thanks mate :) NAT was one area where I believed I could get a real wildcard question in the lab and I wanted to make sure I could pretty much do everything there was to do with NAT. In particular, I found information on NAT/DMVPN topologies (spoke behind NAT, spoke to spoke with one/both behind NAT, hub behind NAT) harder to come by, and none of the major vendors covered it in much/any detail so I decided to hammer it pretty hard. If you chuck IPsec in the mix too then you have to worry about NAT-T, whether to use tunnel or transport, the keys matching the DMVPN NBMAs, etc. I literally have about 19 differnet homemade labs with NAT and DMVPN so I will compile them into a nicer format and put them up here in the next few weeks.
    PsychoFin wrote: »
    Gotta hurry up with those SPv3 boot camps before they change to v4

    Haha well Narbik offered a massive discount on his Facebook page for the v3 SP bootcamp and it works for me because I can just join the webex to watch it (albeit it starts about 3AM for me in Australia). Plus the topics on the v4 interest me a lot, especially LISP and EVPN.
    Alex90 wrote: »
    That's really cool mate I hope to one day have this same feeling! I suppose it's hard to say but, on average how many hours of study were you putting in per week and over what period of time? Did you attand a bootcamp or anything as well?

    I would say most nights were about 3-4 hours. Some were more, some were less, mainly depending on how I was feeling. I knew that it was better to ease off sometimes than try to force a big study session. I could usually tell about 20 minutes into a session whether it was going to work or not. The weekends I would aim for about 5 or 6 hours per day too. I started studying in about March maybe I can't remember exactly. I attended Narbik's 10-day bootcamp in May which added probably another 100+ hours. If you can, definately look at attending a bootcamp!
    Kelkin wrote: »
    Congrats! Definitely got me more motivated

    Thanks mate, I hope to see a thread on here one day for you too!
    Lucas21 wrote: »
    Sure NAT and DMVPN and NAT with other protocols. But he was hammering NAT from every angle for weeks it seemed

    Just a sucker for punishment! Nothing makes you contemplate a new career path than a really really hard NAT problem icon_wink.gif
  • Lucas21Lucas21 Member Posts: 46 ■■□□□□□□□□
    Makes lots of sense covering NAT thoroughly. I'm sure in your case you felt you'd covered pretty much everything well enough. So you were maybe looking to add complexity as well as cover all bases.
  • atorvenatorven Member Posts: 319
    Congrats dude!
  • gorebrushgorebrush Member Posts: 2,743 ■■■■■■■□□□
    Lucas21 wrote: »
    Sure NAT and DMVPN and NAT with other protocols. But he was hammering NAT from every angle for weeks it seemed :D

    Haha yes he was.
  • atorvenatorven Member Posts: 319
    Silly question but does that apply to all the topics on the blue print as well, knowing everything from every possible angle?
  • joelsfoodjoelsfood Member Posts: 1,027 ■■■■■■□□□□
    Atorven, it's really a good idea, as while you may not be required to configure every possible variation, knowing the topic as thoroughly as possible is going to make it that much easier to troubleshoot (because of yoru range of knowledge on the subject)

    More importantly, congratulations man! Great rundown on the test too (without breaking NDA, of course. :) )
  • jamesp1983jamesp1983 Member Posts: 2,475 ■■■■□□□□□□
    Congrats! You deserve it. Enjoy the number.
    "Check both the destination and return path when a route fails." "Switches create a network. Routers connect networks."
  • RouteMyPacketRouteMyPacket Member Posts: 1,104
    Wow, congrats! You are the man! Now, it will be "I'm not happy with one, I want another IE" ha
    Modularity and Design Simplicity:

    Think of the 2:00 a.m. test—if you were awakened in the
    middle of the night because of a network problem and had to figure out the
    traffic flows in your network while you were half asleep, could you do it?
  • lrblrb Member Posts: 526
    Thanks for the kind words guys :)
    atorven wrote: »
    Silly question but does that apply to all the topics on the blue print as well, knowing everything from every possible angle?

    Not a silly question at all! I would say you definitely don't have to know the configuration of every protocol or technologies more obscure features off the top of your head but if you have labbed it once or twice you will at least know when to use that obscure solution to solve a problem.

    OSPF Sham links are a good example. I know what they do, what problem they solve, how to use them, when to use them, but I don't remember the exact configuration off the top of my head. What I do know however is where to find it in the Cisco documentation :)
  • EssendonEssendon Member Posts: 4,546 ■■■■■■■■■■
    HUGE congrats to ya mate on a job really well done!! Are you a Sydneysider mate, just curious.
    NSX, NSX, more NSX..

    Blog >> http://virtual10.com
  • lrblrb Member Posts: 526
    Ess, I'm actually from Canberra but many people I know outside of Australia don't actually know where Canberra is so it's just easier to say Sydney most times :) Are you a Bombers fan?
  • EssendonEssendon Member Posts: 4,546 ■■■■■■■■■■
    I quite like Canberra, bit sleepy and too cold though! Yeah I am a fan, used to be a diehard too but the doping scandal and that douche called James something has done me head in. You into the game too?
    NSX, NSX, more NSX..

    Blog >> http://virtual10.com
  • lrblrb Member Posts: 526
    Haha yeah Canberra is a bit like that. I moved here from Brisbane about 5 and a half years ago so the culture is very different but I definitely won't be here forever! I don't follow the AFL massively anymore but I do quietly support Freo :)
  • fredrikjjfredrikjj Member Posts: 879
    fredrikjj wrote: »
    I have a good feeling about this!


    Told you so! :D
  • silver145silver145 Member Posts: 265 ■■□□□□□□□□
    So how have you celebrated so far?

    also hands down what was the best revision material based on the experience, narbicks WB or INE, or a close split?
  • lrblrb Member Posts: 526
    Celebrated with some drinks in the city the night I found out :D Felt pretty nice to relax and not have anything on the back of my mind for a change!

    Best material? I prefer Narbik's WB (Foundation, Advanced, Advanced TS) out of all. In my opinion if you are comfortable with all of the material in his workbooks and his bootcamp then you are a good shot at passing the lab. The INE ones do however fill in a few gaps and they have mock labs as well so if you can afford it I would try to flip the bill for both (or get work to pay for it!).
  • reaper81reaper81 Member Posts: 631
    lrb wrote: »
    PASS! icon_cheers.gificon_cheers.gif

    Congratulations! And welcome to the club :)
    Daniel Dib
    CCIE #37149
  • Dieg0MDieg0M Member Posts: 861
    Congrats man!
    Follow my CCDE journey at www.routingnull0.com
  • lrblrb Member Posts: 526
    Thanks again for the kind words everyone! I've decided to sit the CCIE SPv4 written when it comes out on May 22 next year so that gives me plenty of time to get lots of reading and labbing in. I'll start another thread when I get back from holidays next week with what books and equipment I intend to use and probably start the CCIE clock at 0 hours.

    Have a good week of study everyone :)
  • gorebrushgorebrush Member Posts: 2,743 ■■■■■■■□□□
    Yes I think I will be doing the same thing, and hopefully will fly out to Belgium for CCIE#2 before the end of 2015.

    2 CCIE's in a year? I'm up for it.
  • lrblrb Member Posts: 526
    Awesome man! Hopefully 2015 will be a good year for both of us :D Just looking over the SP blueprint now it's pretty evident that a lot our R&S knowledge will carry over to the SP, especially OSPF, LDP, BGP, and multicast. Obviously the SP goes into BGP and MPLS in a lot more detail but it's know like we have to start again as, for example, I would have to if I did the Collaboration track.
  • bharvey92bharvey92 Member Posts: 419
    Congrats mate, going from your post you certainly deserve it. Hard works pays off!
    2018 Goal: CCIE Written [ ]
  • gorebrushgorebrush Member Posts: 2,743 ■■■■■■■□□□
    lrb wrote: »
    Awesome man! Hopefully 2015 will be a good year for both of us :D Just looking over the SP blueprint now it's pretty evident that a lot our R&S knowledge will carry over to the SP, especially OSPF, LDP, BGP, and multicast. Obviously the SP goes into BGP and MPLS in a lot more detail but it's know like we have to start again as, for example, I would have to if I did the Collaboration track.

    I have to admit, it's the high amount of crossover that's appealing to get that 2nd out the blocks quickly.. I vaguely remember IS-IS too - I did the "old" CCNP, though I've never touched it since, so I am bound to be a bit rusty on that one :D

    I'll probably go for the v3 written before the end of May then head for Belgium towards Q4.
  • lrblrb Member Posts: 526
    I've sorted through most of my notes in Evernote on DMVPN and compiled a small workbook of TS scenarios for DMVPN. I've created a page on wordpress (ignore the typical title of blog) to distribute it for anyone who is interested. I see a few people have got their lab dates soon so I wanted to get something out quickly that may help these guys in their preparation.

    Link: DMVPN Troubleshooting Scenarios | Internetworking blog by CCIE #45527

    For anyone who uses it, please let me know if there is any typos or mistakes in the initial configs (i.e. wrong hostname, interface does not have a "no shut", etc; obviously don't let me know if it was an obvious omission to create a TS scenario :)) and I will update it for the benefit of others.

    The workbook is in PDF and the initial configs are unfortunately in Word (WP doesn't allow me to update text files or zips).

    I will add more TS scenarios for DMVPN when I find some more time. Enjoy!
  • gorebrushgorebrush Member Posts: 2,743 ■■■■■■■□□□
    Oooo! Very nice, I will give these a go at some point and let you know.
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