Yesterday I was watching the recorded version that Himawan Nugroho presented in English about his unofficial update for the CCIE R&S certification. I’ve been a follower of his blog for several years now, and I’ve to say that during this time he have regularly shared very interesting information, thoughts, tips, … Since the beginning that I’ve seen him as a “offline” mentor for me… basically he really inspires me :-)

So, as an advice, I’ve to say that for all that are preparing for the CCIE R&S lab exam this is something that you shouldn’t skip, neither his blog.

Anyway, back to the session that he presented, I’ve taken a few notes that I will share here. (I’m assuming that there is no problem in sharing this here in my blog!):

  • 2 hours for troubleshooting section with 30 devices using the IOU (virtual environment)
  • 6 hours for configuration section with 9 devices (5 routers and 4 switches):
    • 5 routers:
      • 2x 3825 12.4(T)
      • 3x 1841 12.4(T)
    • 4 switches:
      • 2x 3560 12.2 (Layer 3)
      • 2x 3560 12.2 (Only Layer 2)
  • Total lab duration is 8h
  • If troubleshooting section ends up early, that remain time can be used for configuration section
  • Need to have 80% in each one of the sections to pass
  • Troubleshooting section: 10 incidents
  • Configuration section: 28 config questions
  • There are no more questions on paper. We will have only the web interface
  • General advices:
  1. Re-draw the topology in paper to become more familiar with the network
  2. Verify the initials configurations
  3. No static route
  4. No default route
  5. Don’t remove existing feature
  • Troubleshooting section:
    • You will have access to the Doc CD during the troubleshooting section
    • Skip the tickets that you are not familiar with, or you have to read something from teh Doc CD.
    • There are questions with more than 2 faults but they will tell you
    • The topology involved in each question will be highlighted, so you will not deal with the 30 devices at the same time
    • Any question is independent of the remain questions.
    • 12 minutes to each question in average
  • Possibles diagrams for the configuration section:
    • Physical connections (router-switches connections)
    • Logical topology
    • IGP topology
    • BGP topology
    • Make sure to verify the initial configurations, using ping, cdp, etc…
    • Frame-relay switch will be removed. We will only deal with B2B
    • They only check your running config to check if you is complying with the pre-requisites, for example, to check if you achieve the solution without using the network command
  • Six rules for Troubleshooting by Himawan Nugroho:
  1. Don’t get intimidated
  2. Understand the symptom
  3. Know how it works
  4. Isolate the issue
  5. Work from destination. A difference approach different than physical-layer2-layer3, bottom-up approach. Can telnet, ping, see in R.Table, Any ACL, any filter?
  6. Get used with log and debug
  • Any change to the lab will be announce with 6 months in advance
  • Seems that there is also a good presentation, which is an Official version from Cisco Live – Bruno’s Cisco Live presentation – TECCCIE-3610
Finally I’d like to register a great comment that I’ve read from the Chat window. The author is Marko Milivojevic, which is a very well-known CCIE instructor from IPexpert:
«You don’t fail the CCIE lab. You either pass or don’t pass… Calling it a failure after trying is not fair. It’s one of the most difficult exams in the world!»
Have a nice studies :-)
Advertisement