Eluehike Chiedu S., CCIE #48238
CCIE
When preparing for the CCIE Routing and Switching track, I knew I had to use a vendor that does a serious deep dive on the technologies due to the insane amount of technical information needed to be assimilated to pass the lab. I had heard of other vendors but INE was a no-brainer for me for the CCIE. My preparations took about a year and a half and I was committed full time to it making sure I had no valleys in my reading curve. I spent many hours everyday for the entire period pouring through the ATC videos and working through the workbooks. The Advanced Tech workbook is totally awesome by the way!!! I love how its broken down and I did all the labs twice. Also, Petr's indepth posts on technologies was my gauge to know when I had fully understood a topic. I used virtual devices in GNS and IOU but for technologies it could not emulate, I purchased some tokens to practice on INE's racks. A few months before my exam, I had started literally battling some lab scenarios and complex interactions between technologies in my sleep. I knew then that I was almost ready for the lab...lol. I made sure I was done with the workbooks at least a month before my lab to give me time to relax my brain and formulate my lab attack strategy and also because the brain doesn't typically retain much info under pressure. My Lab day came and the proctor walked us through the time range, instructions and assigned us to our systems. I had some glitches in the troubleshooting section and diagnostics but I was able to eventually pull through and stick to my strategy. My hotel was not far Cisco's office so I walked back after to calm my burning head and I was in my room only a few minutes, checked online and there was my number! Thank you INE for your materials, they really gave me an edge in preparations.