THE BLOG

Book Review: CCIE Routing and Switching v5.0 Official Cert Guide Library (5th Edition)

ccie r/s Jan 28, 2016

If you’re preparing for the CCIE R&S Written Exam or Lab, you need a collection of training materials. Perhaps you watch some training videos; you download a few whitepapers from Cisco’s website; and you read some solid Cisco Press books. For example, Routing TCP/IP Volume I and Volume II by Jeff Doyle should definitely be on your reading list.

Another recent contender, and the focus of this book review, is CCIE Routing and Switching v5.0 Official Cert Guide Library (5th Edition) by Narbik Kocharians, Peter Paluch, and Terry Vinson. The library is a collection of two volumes. Here’s a high-level overview of the content in each volume:

Volume 1

Layer 2 Technologies
IP Addressing and Services
IGPs (e.g. RIP, EIGRP, OSPF, IS-IS, and Route Redistribution)

Volume 2

BGP
Quality of Service (QoS)
WAN Technologies
Multicast
Security
MPLS

You can check out a sample chapter (on QoS) HERE.

I’ve recently been reading through these two books and definitely recommend them for anyone pursuing their CCIE R&S. Specifically, the topics are well organized and are given a treatment that’s more in-depth than what certification candidates are exposed to in their CCNP R&S studies.

Please keep in mind that there is no single product (to my knowledge) that will completely prepare someone for the grueling CCIE R&S Written and Lab exams. However, the convenience of having such a plethora of CCIE R&S Blueprint technologies in a single collection is extremely valuable.

If you’re going after your CCIE in Routing and Switching (or just want a great well-rounded Cisco technology reference), you can purchase this library (of two books) HERE.