The Biggining

Here starts the journey to become a CCIE in Routing and Switching. Well, beginning in the sense that I've already passed the written, but will begin full time study for the lab portion today. My first attempt will be at the end of June at RTP in North Carolina, second will be mid- to late-August. My goals are to pass the first time (who's isn't?), but fully realize I need to plan for at least one failure, with room for a second. Given that they will significantly update the lab Oct 18, 2009, I need to pass before then.

The course material I plan to use is InternetworkExperts workbooks volumes one through three initially (4.1 and 5.0). I then plan to expand into the IPExperts workbooks for an alternate take refresher. Hardware will consist of GNS3/Dynamips for most, if not all, router scenarios. Will probably supplement with rack rentals during the full lab scenarios to get a better feel and experience as well as complete the switching portions. I was originally going to purchase a bunch of equipment from CCBootCamp, but decided against it. It would cost too much ($7k-$12k) and I do not exactly have room for 13U+ (9 routers, 4 switches) of equipment. Plus, it would be loud.

Anywho, here's to the journey. This blog will be to catalog and assist in that journey. For one, it'll be nice to see where I was and how I progress. It'll also be nice to see the troubles I encounter and the solutions. But this blog will also be a reminder of sorts to keep me focused. Nothing motivates more than telling the world you're being lazy by not studying or not showing progress.

Goals for today are:

• Create a baseline topology with default configs to easily clone for future labs
• Begin EIGRP Labs

Creating the topology will be a chore in it's own right as GNS3 can be flaky at times. The EIGRP labs will be a good starter as I believe I already have a very solid understanding and extensive experience using EIGRP in production networks. It'll be a nice easy start.

Let the POAP (Period Of Ass Pain) begin...

Anthony