Happy to say I passed the ROUTE exam last Thursday, which was the last day to test before my CCNA/DA expired on 11th July!
I studied the old BSCI for 18 months on/off before it changed to ROUTE, then moved jobs twice and done on/off study for the ROUTE exam until approx 2 months ago.
So in total 2 years on/off study and 2 months solid labbing, CBT Nuggets, reading SRND's.
Used GNS3, Ciscopress guides and reference notes along with specific websites such as
RIPE Network Coordination Centre (understanding of IPV6 concepts and internet BGP)
IPv6.com - The Source for IPv6 Information, Training, Consulting & Hardwarewww.bgp4.as
.........to name a few and of course I was never out of cisco.com
I've also been working at "CCNP level" on data centre, LAN and WAN environments for approx 5 years and just been too busy to dedicate the time to obtaining the CCNP - the thought of my other certs expiring gave me the kick up the behind I needed to start it again and got some study time from work in the final week too which was good.
In regards to the exam I wasn't too impressed. Cisco's wording is terrible for some questions and the way they expect you to interpret what they mean. They could ask the same question in a different way and make it just as difficult, but perhaps they do this on purpose - who knows.
Just glad to get it out of the way to be honest!
Next onto the SWITCH exam where hopefully the experience from data centre technologies will cover most of the topics.
