What is the CCIE Lab Exam?

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The CCIE Lab Exam is a Cisco Certification exam. The CCIE is Cisco’s highest level of certification
There are only 10 testing centres around the world. Candidates are expected to have at least 5 years
real world experience and will put in at least 1000 hours of study time and for most will spend up to
$12,000 purchasing training materials, ccie lab equipment to practice on and taking time off work to study etc.

The CCIE Lab exam is an eight hour hands-on exam designed to show that the candidate not only knows
Internetworking theory, but can also demonstrate advanced configuration and troubleshooting skills.
Most do not pass on the first try; however they have up to 3 years to pass a second time before they
are then required to take the written test again. In fact a candidate may take the Lab Exam as many
times as possible, spread out 30 days apart, in that 3 year time period. The biggest problem for some
is the cost, which is currently (as of Feb 2012) $1500.00 per attempt and is offered only at
ten Cisco lab exam locations worldwide. You can easily see how this would add up quickly with
multiple attempts.

The first CCIE was Terrance Slattery he was working as a CCIE consultant in 1993 he took the first exam and
was then awarded CCIE #1026

Since then the CCIE numbers are into the 33,000′s with currently around 20,000 live CCIE’s

To maintain the validity of your certification you need to pass a written exam every two years.

There are many tracks to the CCIE programme but the most popular is Routing & Switching.

The reason for this is the availability of training materials, the next most popular is Security and Voice.

The service provider track is another popular choice but the availability of practice hardware makes this exam
only accessible to engineers currently working in an SP environment.

To find out more info about this exam you can look up the CCIE blog of the many candidates studying for the exam.

More info can be found from the Cisco Website.

CCIE Salaries are one of the highest in the IT industry which makes it an enviable qualification to attain.