Stopping LIFE to pursue CCIE Lab

reaper81

Good luck Tell me if you want to discuss anything.

NOC-Ninja

Roguetadhg wrote: »

You got this.

Thanks for the encouragement

NOC-Ninja

Essendon wrote: »

Dont say that! You've been working your bum off for this! Your hard work will pay off.

I really hope so. I met a guy today. He passed CCIE voice after 3 attempts.

NOC-Ninja

reaper81 wrote: »

Good luck Tell me if you want to discuss anything.

I will take anything you want to discuss. lol

jamesp1983

NOC-Ninja wrote: »

thanks. I will need all the luck in the world.

You've made great progress. You got this.

NOC-Ninja

Thanks!

Sucks, my body is giving up on labbing. My eyes hurts after 5hrs of looking on the PC. Time to take a break and continue tomorrow!

NOC-Ninja

Going for 6hrs of labbing today!

Mrock4

Stay with it, keep consistent with your labbing and I'm sure you'll be fine. I'll be sure to track your progress, at the most I'm hoping to sit the lab 3 months after you..at the earliest, only a few weeks after you go.

NOC-Ninja

Goodluck. Last time I check,when I scheduled my test, there was no open dates for december. The only open lab date that was close to 2013 were nov 19 or nov 20. Also, I couldnt schedule a date for january 2013. Anyhow, my first attempt is nov 19 and Im guessing my 2nd attempt will be early January.

3hrs labbing tonight.

Roguetadhg

How do your fingers keep up with the pounding? My fingers are killing me after a couple hours of labbing.

Forsaken_GA

Roguetadhg wrote: »

How do your fingers keep up with the pounding? My fingers are killing me after a couple hours of labbing.

Learn to do your configs in Notepad and copy/paste hehe

Mrock4

NOC-Ninja wrote: »

Goodluck. Last time I check,when I scheduled my test, there was no open dates for december. The only open lab date that was close to 2013 were nov 19 or nov 20. Also, I couldnt schedule a date for january 2013. Anyhow, my first attempt is nov 19 and Im guessing my 2nd attempt will be early January.

3hrs labbing tonight.

There might not end up being any December dates, but if there are, I'm pretty sure you won't see them right now anyway, since the scheduler seemingly only allows you to schedule 6-7 months out. When I looked two months ago, for example, the farthest date out was Aug/September'ish. Works out anyway, I'm not planning on scheduling until probably August, since I'll have a better idea then where I stand in prep.

I'm thinking the same as you- not planning to fail, but coming up with a contingency plan, which involves a 2nd attempt within 3 months of my first one. Hopefully, you take one and call it a day!

NOC-Ninja

I really hope that i get it after 1 attempt. We'll see. Either way there is no looking back pass or fail.

back to studying today. Ive took a break for 2 days since i got sick. Im still sick but i feel better than before. I feel a lil drunk due to the medicine.

labbing for 3hrs tonight.

NOC-Ninja

Weekend labbing. Im sick so i went to kaiser on the morning, got some antibiotics and cough meds, slept and took some meds again. I started labbing at 4pm. Im hoping to lab till 10pm or 11pm. Its hard when Im sick but i have to suck it up.

SteveO86

That kind of determination will see you through this!

Plus you can do a lot of resting after you get CCIE! (Unless you decide to go for another CCIE!)

NOC-Ninja

SteveO86 wrote: »

That kind of determination will see you through this!

Plus you can do a lot of resting after you get CCIE! (Unless you decide to go for another CCIE!)

Next will be CISSP and then CCIE Wireless. I have a friend that going through CCIE-wireless journey. CCIE is a tough quest. Having a friend that went through CCIE wireless will be a big help since his 1 call away and he will be able to point me to the right direction.

NOC-Ninja

more labbing today! locking myself in the house. Im hoping to hit 8hrs or more.

SteveO86

NOC-Ninja wrote: »

Next will be CISSP and then CCIE Wireless. I have a friend that going through CCIE-wireless journey. CCIE is a tough quest. Having a friend that went through CCIE wireless will be a big help since his 1 call away and he will be able to point me to the right direction.

CISSP is an interesting choice, I've always heard that one to be more manager based.

CCIE: W is a nice choice, dual CCIE with a CISSP you will be a force to be reckoned with!

NOC-Ninja

SteveO86 wrote: »

CISSP is an interesting choice, I've always heard that one to be more manager based.

CCIE: W is a nice choice, dual CCIE with a CISSP you will be a force to be reckoned with!

Yeah, I see that cert as a joke. Ive met a lot of CISSP's that i can walk around. I also met some CISSPs that are technical as hell. Im aware that its more on management cert. However, its an icing to the cake. I need it so I can go through HRs stupid filter. Its good for DOD related jobs.

NOC-Ninja

not feeling well but will still lab! MPLS week!

Here's a song for me.

<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKtsdZs9LJo&ob=av3n" target="_blank">

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKtsdZs9LJo

Roguetadhg

hope you get better man.

NOC-Ninja

A little better cause of the antibiotics.

Anyhow, 3 hrs of labbing tonight... A never ending labbing. Yup! mixed emotions.

NOC-Ninja

Whole day of labbing today!

NOC-Ninja

Another whole day of labbing. I hope all this hard work will pay off!

NOC-Ninja

Ive been labbing the whole day since Saturday! I finally got my schedule lockdown.
Monday- 3hrs labbing at night
Tuesday- 3hrs labbing at night
Wednesday- 3hrs labbing at night
Thursday- 3hrs labbing at night
Friday- REST!
Saturday- At least 8hrs of labbing
Sunday- At least 8hrs of labbing
Also, Im having hard time to lab since Im get tired after driving back to work. So Im going to share my techniques that works for me to keep me awake while labbing.

1. I exercise before I lab. Normal lifting weights to keep my blood up. Also, there was an article that says you need to exercise to help your brain.
2. Take a cold shower after exercise. This wakes me up even though Im tired. Usually this does the job.
3. Stretch when you falling asleep while labbing. Try to stretch every hour. This will help you take out the stress and its bad for our to be sitting down all the time.
4. Grab an "ice pack" and put it at the back of your neck. For some reason, this wakes me up and helps me take out the stress. Believe it or not, I feel so stress while labbing. Things gets to my mind like, am i doing it right? what if i fail? how can i make myself more time efficient while labbing? Sooooo many questions runs in my head! lol
5. Take a snooze! I usually set my alarm for 30mins to take a nap. It helps a lot. Takes out the stress from my eyes after looking at the LCD at work for 8hrs.
6. Last resort. Drink monster aka energy drink. I dont really like doing this because it gives your heart palpitation (irregular beating of the heart) and its bad for your teeth. They have high sugar that makes your teeth yellow.

So there you go... Back to labbing for me and I hope you apply this when you feel sleepy and tired!

NOC-Ninja

Another 3hrs tonight! This test eats ALL my free time.

NOC-Ninja

6hrs of labbing tonight!

Essendon

I have personally never seen/heard/read of anyone putting in more time/determination/effort into anything.

Out of curiosity, how much work experience have you got? I'm just thinking maybe your making up for the lack of extensive experience with intensive labbing/reading. Not being rude or a dork, just asking.

NOC-Ninja

Essendon wrote: »

I have personally never seen/heard/read of anyone putting in more time/determination/effort into anything.

Out of curiosity, how much work experience have you got? I'm just thinking maybe your making up for the lack of extensive experience with intensive labbing/reading. Not being rude or a dork, just asking.

Thanks 2 years at a large enterprise. Years of experience will ONLY help you to a point. Its impossible for a network engineer/ network admin to deal with the whole CCIE blueprint. Depending on their company, they will only support a few technologies. Some only deals with pure EIGRP, some pure OSPF, or little BGP, some mix but its still not enough to deal with the whole ccie blueprint in a daily basis. I know some people only deals with routers and it goes on. The lab will breakdown a network engineer with years of experience if he is not good at every subject.

We have a network architect which has a more than 8 years experience in enterprise that failed in a ccie lab. This scenario is not really a surprise. Scott Morris explained this more on one of his audio tutorial.

Furthermore, studying this much is normal if you want to pass CCIE. If you read other forums that CCIE post on "how they pass" the lab, you wont see them posting "oh i have 10 years experience, I only need to study a few hours since I have hands on experience on this technology and I know I will pass."

I know a few of CCIE that said, they study 40hrs a week for a year and 6 months to pass the test. These guys are network engineers/architect of large enterprise.

thiagomh

I personally started my CCIE R&S journey...couples books to read..about 8! Topics to be learned/refreshed. With family to take care and have to coordinate studies. I scheduled my written for 9/2012 and have to schedule lab. Pretty much reading everyday at home for couple hours plus weekends. Already have a lab with 8 routers and getting some 3750's with 4000 chassis (fully loaded) and 2950's to have some fun with. I've into similar road before while taking ccna, ccda, ccnp, ccdp...now just refreshing!

Good luck for you and go hard OR go home! :P