Starting CCIE Written. Just had "the talk" with Mrs. Zartan.

Zartanasaurus

Day 54 - 4 hours
Total - 270.5 hours

EIGRP: 5.11-5.21. ATC Video 60.
BGP: Practical BGP Chapters 8-9. New Q&A Rep 1.

Zartanasaurus

Day 55-56 - 8.5 hours
Total - 279 hours

Bridging & Switching: 1.16-1.21, 1.26, 1.30-32 Rep 2
Frame Relay: 2.9-2.16 Rep 2
RIP: 4.12-22 Rep 2
BGP: Practical BGP Chapter 10
MPLS: ATC Videos 104-107

Zartanasaurus

Day 57 - 5 hours
Total - 284

Apparently my server is crashing at random and losing network connectivity. It seemed like it was asleep, but it wouldn't wake up when I hit the spacebar and clicked the mouse. Was fine after a reboot (not counting the fact that I have to start NetworkManager manually now since installing updates a week ago and it randomly decides which of the 2 non-GNS3 NICs is going to work this time). Went in with the idea of getting some labbing done today, but it was down again. There was a bad thunderstorm in the area at the time and I didn't feel like driving 25 mins into town just to restart my server. I'm just gonna move it somewhere else so it has KVM access.

BGP: New Q&A Rep 2.
MPLS: ATC Videos 108-109.
QoS: Decided to start with the book recommended by Brian Dennis in his vSeminar, QoS-Enabled Networks. 4 chapters in and so far so good. It seems to be designed around the "introduce a lot of concepts at a high level then tie them together in the first section, then go deeper into them later" style vs the "Go deep into a single subject before introducing the next one" style. Reminds me a lot of Developing IP Multicast Networks in that regard, so I think I will like it.

I finished Practical BGP yesterday and I wanted to say that I thought it was a pretty good book. I can't say why exactly, but it seemed a lot easier to follow than Routing TCP/IP Vol II. You have to put up with a lot of typos though. The strangest part is they even appear in show outputs. Almost like he typed in what he thought it was going to be instead of just copying and pasting the actual show output. Kind of a pain when you're trying to learn how something is supposed to work, then get confused trying to reconcile the output and realize the next-hop value should be 2.2.2.2 instead of 1.1.1.1. Another favorite is when he's explaining traffic flows with a diagram, and says it will prefer the path through B and you look at the diagram and it's obvious he meant C.

At some point in the future I'll take on the Halabi book so I can truly compare the two and come up with a reason why Brian recommended the book he did.

ipSpace

When is your CCIE written scheduled ? i think with the hours you put it, you should be ready.

jamesp1983

you should get your written over with since you've racked up so many hours. Great work! do you feel like you're ready?

Zartanasaurus

Still have to do Services, Security and QoS. Also need to brush up on MSTP. Looking at the blueprint, some of the Security topics should be a review of CCNA: Security.

Forsaken_GA

all y'all encouraging him to take the Written now need to remember that once you pass the Written, the 18 month clock starts. If he doesn't feel as though he'll be ready to take the Lab within those 18 months, then he's essentially wasting money, as he'll just have to take the Written again.

ipSpace

You're correct Forsaken. Nice point of view!

Zartanasaurus

I guesstimate I'm 60-65% ready to take the Written. I've been studying like I'm preparing for the lab up to this point with some modifications. I think I might want to complete through Week 12 of the INE training schedule before I sit for the Written. That would put me at 35 weeks of training left with no distractions of preparing simultaneously for the Written. We'll see, I'm kind of playing this by ear.

Day 58 - 3.5 hours
Total - 287.5 hours

EIGRP: 5.11-5.21 Rep 2.
Multicast: 8.1-8.10 Rep 3. A note to anyone who is going further in WB Vol I. Make sure you set the system MTU back to 1500 when you're done, otherwise you'll sit there wondering why certain OSPF adjacencies won't form after loading initial configs. It's not fixed with a simple write erase. Dunno if the factory reset with the front panel button fixes that. It gave me a nice little impromptu troubleshooting session where I wasn't expecting it though

I really need to get started on my MPLS Q&A and labs tomorrow. It's been almost two weeks since I finished the book and started the videos. MPLS and QoS are the last two initial knowledge hurdles I have to get over before I start to judge my readiness.

Zartanasaurus

Day 59 - 10 hours
Total - 297.5 hours


Multicast: Q&A Rep 3.
MPLS: 14.1 - 14.7 & Q&A Rep 1. MPLS Course videos 2 - 14.


Feels good to start making headway on MPLS again. 8.5 hours worth of MPLS videos left for tomorrow, including the MPLS-TE stuff, although its my understanding that that's not covered. It's only two videos though, so why not? Maybe I'll be able to follow more than 10% of Ivan Pepelnjak's blog now.

Zartanasaurus

Day 60 - 6 hours
Total - 303.5 hours

MPLS: MPLS Courses videos 15 - 29. I didn't watch the 2nd video on MPLS-TE. I'm going to consider myself "done" with this topic for now as far as reading/videos goes. For some reason I feel like a major weight is off my shoulders now. It was good reinforcement of what I had already learned with the ATC and MPLS Fundamentals book, plus a little extra that I had zoned out on before.

My motivation has had ups and downs the last couple weeks and it's definitely at a high point right now. Need to strike while the iron is hot. You tell QoS I'm coming and hell's coming with me!!

Zartanasaurus

Day 61 - 5 hours
Total - 308.5 hours

QoS: Chapters 5-8 in QoS-Enabled Networks. Skipped the last two chapters on VPLS and Mobile QoS. Seems like you should read this book before you read any other books on QoS. Vendor neutral and doesn't include configuration, but goes over a lot of the QoS tools available. It's less than 250 pages, so it doesn't take long to read at all. Watched video #2 in QoS Exam Course. Only 17 hours worth of videos left.

Zartanasaurus

Day 62 - 7.5 hours
Total - 316 hours

QoS: QoS Exam Videos 3-15. ~9 hours of videos left. Big day of labbing repetitions coming up tomorrow, so there's likely no chance I finish all of the QoS videos.

spiderjericho

I started a thread asking what were the recommended CCIE videos. Do you think the second series of INE videos you're watching are good (ie well structured, clear instruction)?

Zartanasaurus

spiderjericho wrote: »

I started a thread asking what were the recommended CCIE videos. Do you think the second series of INE videos you're watching are good (ie well structured, clear instruction)?

I've watched the CCIP videos for MPLS and I'm halfway through QoS. I think they are excellent. They teach you from start to finish with the assumption that you know next to nothing about the subject matter.

spiderjericho

I have the BGP, MPLS and Advanced Topics (just not the basic CCIE written and the lab videos). Guess I can get the written, buy work books and go from there.

Zartanasaurus

One downside to the QoS class is he doesn't spend much time in the CLI.

Zartanasaurus

Day 63 - 9.5 hours
Total - 325.5 hours


Bridging & Switching: 1.16 - 21, 1.26, 1.30-32: Rep 3.
Frame Relay: 2.9 - 2.16: Rep 3.
RIP: 4.12 - 22: Rep 3.
MPLS: Q&A, 14.1 - 14.7: Rep 2.
QoS: QoS Exam Videos 16-26. I like the exam quality review questions that are put in, but I feel like this series could go a lot faster if he stopped talking about movies and other unrelated things. Also, instead of showing slide after slide of info with the occasional CLI command thrown in, I feel like he could spend more time at the CLI. Typing the command into the slides is even weirder. I'm just going to stop here and go with the QoS Exam Guide book for tomorrow.

This week is pretty clear as far as any scheduled repetitions go and I need to start going deeper into Vol I for OSPF, BGP, IPv6 and Multicast. I'll just do 1 topic per day and go ~15 or so tasks deep. It's been a while since I've done anything with OSPF or BGP and I don't want to atrophy. My goal for this week is to do the above and finish the QoS ECG. After I finish that and Network Security Technologies & Solutions I'll start on the CCIE Guide. Looks like I'm at about 4,000 pages read.

Forsaken_GA

Configuration is actually the easy part of QoS, there's not a whole lot involved on the CLI, except for maybe FRTS.


The design and planning of a good QoS policy takes alot more effort and time than the actual implementation. If you're spending a crapload of time at the CLI with QoS based configuration, you're usually troubleshooting it.

Zartanasaurus

Day 64 - 7.5 hours
Total - 333 hours

QoS: QoS Exam videos 27-36. QoS ECG Chapters 1-2.

Zartanasaurus

Day 65 - 4 hours
Total - 337 hours

EIGRP: 5.11 - 5.21 Rep 3
QoS: QoS ECG Chapters 3-4.

Zartanasaurus

Day 66-68 - 13.5 hours
Total - 350.5 hours

QoS: QoS ECG 5-8, 10
Security: Network Security Technologies & Solutions, Chapter 2.
MPLS: Q&A, 14.1-14.7 Rep 3.

Chapter 9 of the QoS ECG is all about 2950 QoS and I'd rather just read the Cisco Docs on the 3560. Despite the fact that my to-do list of books to read has shrunk considerably, I find it hard to believe I'm only at ~4200 pages read. Feels like twice that. I slacked off quite a bit last week in the name of rest. Time to pick up the pace again! This security book is 770 pages of content, but it looks like you can get at least 90% of the blueprint in Chapters 2-5, 7,8 & 11 and maybe a section or two here and there from other chapters. That's only 214 pages. Glad I got this from Safari Books instead of paying $35.

Zartanasaurus

Day 69 - 5.5 hours
Total - 356 hours

QoS: Q&A Rep 1. Instead of waiting until I was done watching every video and reading multiple books, I should've made review questions on a per topic basis. The amount of time from when I first started making questions until I actually went and tried to answer them all was too long. Took me several passes to get them at 100%.

Security: NST&S, Chapters 3-5, 7,8. Mapping to the expanded blueprint, this book has covered all of 6.01, 6.02 minus Parameter maps, 6.03 - 6.07 & 6.14 except for Image Verification and Flexible Packet Matching. Chapter 11 should take care of the 6.10 802.1x topics. Going to read some of Chapter 12 for wireless 802.1x as well for work purposes. 40 pages total if I read them both straight through. This book pretty much covers everything, although not in much detail. Between this and maybe the CCNA: Security Quick Reference you should be able to get familiar with everything.

I have some labbing to catch up on tomorrow, then it's on the the CCIE Cert Guide. I also want to go deeper into WBI for OSPF, BGP, Multicast and IPv6 over the next week.

Zartanasaurus

Day 70 - 4.5 hours
Total - 360.5 hours

Bridging & Switching: 1.15 - 1.21, 1.26, 1.30 - 1.32
Frame Relay: 2.1 - 2.16
RIP: 4.1 - 4.22
Security: NST&S, Chapters 11 & 12. I don't see anything else in this book that maps to the blueprint or that I'm interested in for other reasons. About 6 hours of Security ATC videos to top it off then I'll take care of the Q&A questions I made.

For the topics that I went deeper into Vol I than suggested I'm just repeating them every 30 days to keep them fresh. Didn't mean to do 3 different topics today, but I got home yesterday and my server locked up (again). Going to spread them out so I'm only doing one per day.

Zartanasaurus

Day 71 - 7 hours
Total - 367.5 hours

Bridging & Switching: CCIE ECG Chapter 1.
Security: ATC Videos 138-146.

Zartanasaurus

Day 72 - 9 hours
Total - 376.5 hours

Bridging & Switching: I've started the process of going down the expanded blueprint and consolidating my handwritten notes into Evernote. Also creating new Q&A. It's working as a nice review although it's time consuming. CCIE ECG Chapters 2-3.

EIGRP: 5.1-5.21. Set to repeat in 1 month.

Services: ECG Chapters 4-5.

Zartanasaurus

Day 73 - 5.5 hours
Total - 382 hours

Services: ATC Videos 147-153. Spent some time going back over my notes to make Services Q&A. The ECG is a little thin on details when it comes to services & security topics, so I spent some time reading Cisco Docs as well as a few CCIE blogs on VRRP/HSRP/GLBP. The CCNP Switch OCG was on sale for $9.99 a while ago, so I picked that up just in case. I think I'm going to have to read it for MSTP at the very least.

Understanding & Troubleshooting HSRP
FHRP comparison chart
HSRP
VRRP and Load Sharing
GLBP

I have pretty good new Q&A for the L2 topics. I was going to wait until I had everything in that domain, but I decided to get started on the repetitions tomorrow and save the Frame Relay and PPP stuff for a separate Q&A. Going to do Q&A for that, Services & Security tomorrow then read up on MSTP and put that into a Q&A as well before continuing with the CCIE ECG. Then it's back into the meat with routing protocols.

Zartanasaurus

Day 74 - 6.5 hours
Total - 388.5 hours
Bridging & Switching: New Q&A Rep 1.
IP Routing: CCIE ECG Chapter 6.
EIGRP: CCIE ECG Chapter 7. Fully consolidated notes into Evernote with new Q&A ready to go for tomorrow.
OSPF: CCIE ECG Chapter 8. About halfway finished on notes and new Q&A.
Security: New Q&A Rep 1.
IP Services: New Q&A Rep 1.

About 1/3 of the way through the ECG. Combined with the consolidation of my notes and generating revised Q&A, it's going really well. Going to finish my notes and Q&A on OSPF tomorrow then do Rep 1 of Q&A for EIGRP/OSPF, followed by going deeper into WB Vol I for OSPF. After that, repeat the same process for BGP. If I can get all the way through Chapters 9-11 plus completed notes/Q&A for BGP tomorrow, I will be happy. Anything else is gravy.

Zartanasaurus

Day 75-76 - 11.5 hours
Total - 400 hours

IP Routing: ECG Chapter 9.
EIGRP: New Q&A Rep 1.
OSPF: New Q&A & 6.15 - 6.31 Rep 1.
BGP: ECG Chapter 10.

Continuing the process of getting all my notes into Evernote. Splitting BGP into two parts (Fundamental & Routing Policies) to match the chapters in the ECG. After I finish Chapter 11, it's deeper into the BGP labs.

Zartanasaurus

Day 77 - 5.5 hours
Total - 405.5 hours

BGP: ECG Chapter 11. Notes consolidated and 50 new Q&A created for tomorrow.

52% through the ECG. I was supposed to do MPLS labs today, but I'm gonna hold off until I get to Chapter 19. I have Q&A review for 4 topics tomorrow, then I'm going deep into BGP in WB I. I'm going to skim through the 3 chapters on QoS to see if anything jumps out at me that I need in my notes, but I think I'm good after reading the QoS guide.