News: Antonie Henning Passed!

Thanks for visiting! If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. This blog posts regular tutorials, news, and study tips about networking, especially about Cisco CCIE related topics. Go ahead, subscribe to the feed! You can also receive updates from this blog via email. Thanks for visiting!Antonie Henning, the blogger [...]

Blog: Cisco, the new CCIE Plaques suck!

I got my CCIE plaque in the mail yesterday.To be honest, I’m really disappointed. I wish they didn’t get rid of the old ones (Greg I’m soooo jealous!). After all that hard work, this thing looks like its made out of plastic. What am I saying, it IS made out of plastic! Plastic with a bit of glass stuck on the front. Bring back the old medallions. That is something you can show of with pride! Continue reading for a photo…

Keith Tokash CCIE#21236

Keith passed! Well deserved. He’s built a monster gaming rig and celebrating right now. Head on over to CCIECandidate and congratulate him!
“F*&^ this lab! That’s right, right where it hurts. I decided that if the lab exam was a person I was going to do the equivalent of knocking its damned teeth into its [...]

Blog: The Whole Ethan Thing….

No doubt if your a follower of the other CCIE blogs, and a regular reader of groupstudy you would have seen this whole thing about Robert Williams from CertGuard slamming Ethan Banks for cheating on his exam. CCIEPursuit summed it up nicely, as did Matt Hill, Collin McNamara, Deon Botha and Greg Ferro.

Blog: CCIE:R&S…Done…Now What?

After doing what anybody passing their CCIE does (killing brain cells with beer), I had time to reflect on what has been an awesome year so far. I’ve had emails from all around the world, calls from family and friends congratulating me. But you wouldn’t believe how many emails, and conversations I’ve had that contained the question “What are your plans next? Now what?”…

Awesome Collection of Cisco Links

Michael Morris has updated his blog on NetworkWorld.com with a HUGE collection of useful cisco related links. Found a few gems in there!

Blog: My CCIE story….

I have been waiting to write this post. I am just so deliriously happy right now. Before I start, I want to thank my beautiful wife for her support. She was that voice I heard in my head that told me to just keep going, and never give up when I’d lost hope. I’m glad [...]

CCIE #20716

I passed. I’m so happy right now. :)
I’ll post a full write up later…time for a scotch or three!!! CCIE #20716…has a nice ring to it!

Victor Cappuccio Passed!

Looks like another one of the bloggers I read regularly has passed: Congratulations Victor Cappuccio CCIE#20657! Man, all these CCIE bloggers passing…not that I didn’t feel enough pressure already! :)

Ethan Passed!!! CCIE #20655

Head on over to Ethan Banks blog and congratulate him on getting his CCIE! That is awesome news. Well done Ethan CCIE #20655!

Blog: 10 Days to go…Last Mock Lab Done!

“Knowing is not enough. We must apply.” -Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.

I just finished Mock Lab 7 which is the hardest of the Mock Labs. I should probably rephrase that…it is the Mock Lab with the highest difficulty rating. I actually thought this one was easier than Mock Lab 4 (which is the spawn of satan! lol). I answered everything. There were plenty of tricky questions but each question was fairly independent of the others so if you stuffed one up, it didn’t really effect any other question. Couple of things I had to figure out because I had never done before, but that is where the DocCD really helped.

Blog: 17 days to go….

I spent this morning going through Mock Lab 6 again. I booked a 6 hour lab session and gave myself a challenge of completing the whole thing in those 6 hours. I just managed to do it (with a few minutes to spare!). I had spent the greater part of Thursday and Friday going through it thoroughly, analyzing it, trying out different things and multiple solutions. I figured out a couple of things that I stuffed up the first time.

Repeating labs definitely helps. I tend to do a lab now repeatedly until I know it back to front. A lot of people have said “what is the point of doing a lab over and over again, you just end up memorizing it”. This is true in some respects, but what I tend to do is go through the lab again until I don’t need to look up the answers for that lab.

Blog: CCIE Assessor Lab B

I got 70%. Pretty disappointed about this one, as I missed some easy masks. Some I lost because of the grading again looks for very specific answers (although I think this grading script was better than the last one).

Blog: Doc CD Issues and fixes

It looks like even if you don’t have access, or you think you might require access to a DocCD resource that is missing, the proctor is able to give you access to those missing/broken links. This was from the proctor in the Sydney lab as well, so that is a bit of a relief. I am still going to make sure I know how to find the information on all the versions of the DocCD, but it is still nice to know.

Blog: CCIE Assessor Lab A

I just finished my CCIE Assesor Lab A. I got 72%. I have mixed feelings about this one. The script looks for very specific answers but it gave you a fantastic insight on what Cisco is looking for in terms on configuration and how they mark your exam….

Geek Humour….

nslookup 69.69.69.69
Try it. lol

Blog: 28 days to go….A day in the life of a CCIE candidate

4:45am: Crawl out of bed. I went to bed at around 11pm last night, and couldn’t really get to sleep. My brain just wouldn’t unwind, and I kept thinking about a redistribution problem i was trying to solve. My quality of sleep has definitely gone down lately. I’ve been doing a minimum of 12 hours a day on labs, and then about an hour watching COD videos before dozing off. I think i need to take a rest day sometime soon. Maybe just watch COD videos all day, otherwise I think I will burn out.

Blog: 40 days to go…

Well, I completed my first Mock Lab (IE Mocklab 5) last night. The Mock Lab was great and did just what I wanted it to do: push me just that little bit harder than I was used to. It definitely got me out of my comfort zone. It was rated an 8, which is supposed to be harder than the actual lab. This is a little comforting, because I didn’t do as well on it as I’d hoped.

Blog: 68 Days to Go….

After reading through the fantastic (and inspirational!) CCIE in 3 months blog I’ve decided I need to get more organised. His post on his dynamips environment contained something that literally caused me to sit up and say “now why the heck haven’t i been doing that!”. In the post is a picture of a pdf file, that he fills out after each and every lab that he completes to grade himself.

Blog: My Favourite Net Things

I’m feeling a bit more confident about the lab. I have been working steadily through the IE workbook and things are falling into place nicely. I still need to work on my speed and accuracy but i can do the Core (Switching, Routing, BGP) sections of most of the labs within 2-3 hours. This is a big improvement for me.

Blog: Network World features Ardenpackeer.com blog!

G’day Networkworld.com Readers!
You can imagine my suprise when I discovered that Network World has published a list of 20 useful sites for Cisco networking professionals that includes none other than ardenpackeer.com! Wow!
There are some awesome sites on that list and its definitely worth checking it out. Most of these have been on my list [...]

ccieblog.com

I discovered this while reading my rss reeds. It is a CCIE Blog portal! It has all the major CCIE blogs and even has provision to set up your own CCIE blog! What a great idea! I wish something like this was around when i was first looking around for CCIE blogs! If you [...]

Blog: CCIE Practice Lab Built

I’ve got my own practice labs! Well it’s not really mine, but work has graciously let me do my CCIE prep on the BSCI gear they have. What this means is that when a BSCI class is not running, I can use it for my CCIE lab prep. We run a BSCI class about once a month, so that means the rest of the time its mine! The BSCI kit consists of 14x 2600 routers, 1x 2522, and 1x 2950. I’ve cabled it up to mimic the Internetwork Expert Topology (minus the 4 switches!). All the 2600’s are cabled into the 2950, and the 2522 acts as an 8 port Frame-relay switch for 8 of the 2600’s.

Blog: Merry Christmas!

I’ve decided to take a break from study for the next week and start up again after New Years. I want to spend as much time with my wife as possible during our break together and before she starts work in the New Year. And besides…its Cricket Season! Hopefully the break will allow the QoS [...]

Resources

Links & Resources

Amazon.com Widgets
Cisco Resources:

Cisco Doc CD
Dynagen
Dynamips
Hacki’s Dynamips & Dynagen Forum
GNS-3
CCIE R&S Lab Blueprint
CCIE R&S Written Blueprint
CCIE Secrets eBook
CCIE Agent - Specializing in Hiring CCIE’s
IP Multicast training slides from Cisco
CCIE>Blog_ - Create your own CCIE Blog!
networking-forum.com - Cisco Networking Forum

Cisco [...]