Rating: 
Summary: Great Addition to CCIE Library
Review: I would highly recommend "CCIE Self Study: CCIE Practical Studies Volume II" by Karl Solie and Leah Lynch, ISBN 1587050722, to anyone who is preparing for their CCIE certification. After enjoying the first volume in this series, I was excited to see the release of the second volume. I found that as is the case in most Cisco Press books, the authors did a great job presenting the information in an easy to follow format and provided plenty of valuable examples and configurations. One thing that was great to see is that the book reflects the updated CCIE lab format (2-day to 1-day) and equipment specifications (mainly the addition of the 3550 switch). I would have to conclude that one of the main things that set this book apart from others is the practice labs that are found through out the book. The labs do a great job of driving home the concepts that are introduced. Keep in mind that most of the labs do require some pretty expensive equipment in order to perform the labs. Book Details
The book is broken up into six main areas: Ethernet Switching - This section covers the basic concepts of Ethernet switching such as Vlans, VTP, Spanning Tree and Ether channel. In addition to the basic concepts, a large amount of the section is dedicated to the setup and configuration of the new 3550 Catalyst switch. Controlling Network Propagation and Network Access - This section covers creating and implementing Route Maps and Policy-Based Routing. There are four practice labs in the section and I found them very useful. Multicast Routing - Just as the name implies, this section deals with the basics of Multicast such as IP addressing and Multicast Routing Protocols. PIM is covered in good detail along with Joining and troubleshooting. Performance Management and Quality of Service - Performance management deals with switching modes and compression schemes. I would have liked to have seen some additional information regarding ways to increase performance but overall I was impressed with the detail of the information that is included. I specifically like the section that deals with determining the performance of the router. It introduces the reader to the show and debug commands that are the most useful in determining the performance of the device. The QOS section covers a wide variety of methods to control traffic. Knowing a great deal on the theory of QOS but lacking in the area of seeing the actual results of implementing QOS, I really enjoyed working through the two labs that are available. BGP Theory and Configuration - With out a doubt the largest section of the book. Everything is covered from the basics to path attributes to reflectors and confederations. The advanced BGP section deals with filtering routes and creating routing policies by using path attributes. If you really want to learn BGP, the BGP sections are definitely for you. CCIE Preparation Labs - This section contains five CCIE preparation labs that force you to apply everything that is covered in this book. The labs are great CCIE mock labs. These labs alone are worth the cost of the book. The book includes a CD that contains all of the diagrams and solutions to the CCIE Preparation labs found in Chapter 10. This is a great addition because it allows you to print out the diagrams to make notes on as well as cut and paste the configurations if needed. The CD also includes sample chapters from other Cisco Press CCIE books. I would have to say that this book would be a great addition to anyone's networking reference library. It will benefit someone who is pursuing the Cisco CCIE certification or someone who is just trying to implement the topics that are covered. The only item that I think is lacking is the performance management section. Additional methods of managing and increasing performance should have been included. Overall, the examples and illustrations are plentiful and well done, the content is well written, and the practice labs are useful. I would highly recommend. CCIE Self Study: CCIE Practical Studies Volume II
Karl Solie, CCIE No. 4599
Leah Lynch, CCIE No. 7220
Cisco Press
ISBN: 1-58705-072-2
Rating: 
Summary: Not Your Average CCIE Book
Review: Karl Solie and Leah Lynch's "CCIE Practical Studies, Volume II" (ISBN: 1587050722, Cisco Press) is a valuable addition to the CCIE candidate's arsenal of study materials, and provides new perspective on foundational topics, while diving deeper into more obscure areas. This second volume allows the authors to move beyond the core suite of CCIE required knowledge (e.g., Frame Relay, IGP's, PPP) in order to explore in practical ways the other key study areas. The book covers six major categories: •Advanced Ethernet Switching with the Catalyst 3550
•Route Maps & Policy Based Routing
•Multicast Routing
•Router Performance Management - ATM, Switching Modes ,Compression
•QoS - Intserv, Diffserv, Rate Limiting, Queuing
•BGP-4 The book offers insight for all reader experience levels -- from those in the early stages of CCIE lab preparation to the advanced readers who are fine tuning their lab skills. At either end of the spectrum, this book serves as a complimentary volume and should be read along with the other suite of CCIE absolute "must reads" (e.g., Doyle's "Routing TCP/IP, Vols.1,2", Halabi's "Internet Routing Architectures"). Solie and Lynch's second volume's value is how it offers just enough theory to keep the novice going, but not so much as to overly repeat what has already been extensively written about. This same concept of minimal overlap extends past the theory and into the content and practice labs. Even though much of what is explored has been covered in other books, Solie and Lynch frame the material in a different way and offer numerous, helpful examples. In addition, each major category spends at least some time exploring concepts that have not historically been well documented. A simple example of this is how the authors provide real examples of how and when to use the ORIGIN attribute to filter BGP routes. Where previously other authors only provided conceptual details of the ORIGIN attribute, Solie and Lynch give practical examples of how it actually works and how you can manipulate BGP routing with it. In addition to exploring unfamiliar concepts, the strength of the book is in how the authors explain concepts in a simple manner and reinforce those ideas with easy to understand illustrations and multiple hands-on lab examples (assuming you have equipment to use). The book ends with five CCIE mock labs, with a companion CD that has the configs and solutions for the lab, as well as terminal emulation software. Strangely enough, considering that the book spends so much time covering QoS and BGP especially, the five CCIE labs do not really push the technical difficulty limits for these categories. There are only a few drawbacks to this book. The chapter on the Catalyst 3550 could have benefited by cutting out the spanning-tree and trunking theory (much of which was simply duplicated from the first volume), and spending more time on other practical examples of advanced configuration (e.g. 802.1X, IP phone port configuration). Each chapter afterwards, however, seemed to get better than the previous. One minor point of frustration is the periodic errors found in the diagrams provided (e.g. wrong IP addresses, etc.). A few diagrams in the BGP section are not legible due to printing errors, but an errata was released to correct that problem and can be found online at ciscopress.com. For the most part, however, these drawbacks are only minor compared to the value of the overall book. Lastly, although not necessarily a fault in itself, as a compilation of various technologies, the book is not capable of going into fine detail in each of its categories and leaves the reader wanting for more examples and labs. Hence the reason this book must be considered a complimentary piece to the overall CCIE's library and not just a standalone work (not that there really is one). People looking for a single book to prepare them for the CCIE lab exam will be disappointed with this book, as they will with any other book. "CCIE Practical Studies, Volume II" is an excellent resource for CCIE lab candidates. Additionally, it is a helpful resource to network professionals in general as it provides valuable and "real world" applicable knowledge of routing and switching.
Rating:
Summary: Not Your Average CCIE Book
Review: Karl Solie and Leah Lynch's "CCIE Practical Studies, Volume II" (ISBN: 1587050722, Cisco Press) is a valuable addition to the CCIE candidate's arsenal of study materials, and provides new perspective on foundational topics, while diving deeper into more obscure areas. This second volume allows the authors to move beyond the core suite of CCIE required knowledge (e.g., Frame Relay, IGP's, PPP) in order to explore in practical ways the other key study areas. The book covers six major categories: • Advanced Ethernet Switching with the Catalyst 3550
• Route Maps & Policy Based Routing
• Multicast Routing
• Router Performance Management - ATM, Switching Modes ,Compression
• QoS - Intserv, Diffserv, Rate Limiting, Queuing
• BGP-4 The book offers insight for all reader experience levels -- from those in the early stages of CCIE lab preparation to the advanced readers who are fine tuning their lab skills. At either end of the spectrum, this book serves as a complimentary volume and should be read along with the other suite of CCIE absolute "must reads" (e.g., Doyle's "Routing TCP/IP, Vols.1,2", Halabi's "Internet Routing Architectures"). Solie and Lynch's second volume's value is how it offers just enough theory to keep the novice going, but not so much as to overly repeat what has already been extensively written about. This same concept of minimal overlap extends past the theory and into the content and practice labs. Even though much of what is explored has been covered in other books, Solie and Lynch frame the material in a different way and offer numerous, helpful examples. In addition, each major category spends at least some time exploring concepts that have not historically been well documented. A simple example of this is how the authors provide real examples of how and when to use the ORIGIN attribute to filter BGP routes. Where previously other authors only provided conceptual details of the ORIGIN attribute, Solie and Lynch give practical examples of how it actually works and how you can manipulate BGP routing with it. In addition to exploring unfamiliar concepts, the strength of the book is in how the authors explain concepts in a simple manner and reinforce those ideas with easy to understand illustrations and multiple hands-on lab examples (assuming you have equipment to use). The book ends with five CCIE mock labs, with a companion CD that has the configs and solutions for the lab, as well as terminal emulation software. Strangely enough, considering that the book spends so much time covering QoS and BGP especially, the five CCIE labs do not really push the technical difficulty limits for these categories. There are only a few drawbacks to this book. The chapter on the Catalyst 3550 could have benefited by cutting out the spanning-tree and trunking theory (much of which was simply duplicated from the first volume), and spending more time on other practical examples of advanced configuration (e.g. 802.1X, IP phone port configuration). Each chapter afterwards, however, seemed to get better than the previous. One minor point of frustration is the periodic errors found in the diagrams provided (e.g. wrong IP addresses, etc.). A few diagrams in the BGP section are not legible due to printing errors, but an errata was released to correct that problem and can be found online at ciscopress.com. For the most part, however, these drawbacks are only minor compared to the value of the overall book. Lastly, although not necessarily a fault in itself, as a compilation of various technologies, the book is not capable of going into fine detail in each of its categories and leaves the reader wanting for more examples and labs. Hence the reason this book must be considered a complimentary piece to the overall CCIE's library and not just a standalone work (not that there really is one). People looking for a single book to prepare them for the CCIE lab exam will be disappointed with this book, as they will with any other book. "CCIE Practical Studies, Volume II" is an excellent resource for CCIE lab candidates. Additionally, it is a helpful resource to network professionals in general as it provides valuable and "real world" applicable knowledge of routing and switching.
Rating:
Summary: Great material for advanced networks or CCIE
Review: Whether you're chasing the improbable CCIE certification or building an advanced network, "CCIE Self Study: CCIE Practical Studies, Volume II" by Karl Solie and Leah Lynch, ISBN 1587050722 is a guide to several key topics along the way. More than just a CCIE study guide, this book balances test preparation and real world skills in an informative but easy-to-read book. Without a word of review from the first volume, the first chapter hits the street and it doesn't look back. In addition, detailed practice labs are interspersed with the subject material so the reader can "make permanent" the skills being covered. Book Sections: Advanced Switching, focusing on the Catalyst 3550
Route maps, Policy-based routing
Multicast Routing
Performance Management
Quality of Service
BGP Theory and Practice Several of the chapters covered those elusive details that are never covered well enough in the documentation. The chapter on route maps and policy routing exposes the true flow of match statements and deny clauses, while the QoS chapter covers just the right amount to help the reader simulate live traffic through an RSVP-enabled network. The BGP chapters (350 pages!) cover peer establishment troubleshooting (oh so important for the CCIE exam!) and the finer points of developing a large-scale network (not just the options, but the deciding factors and the ramifications thereof). Carefully separated into theory, practice, and advanced topics, the authors lead the reader steadily through design, implementation, and tuning topics. The CCIE exam requires the candidate to able to conquer all of these issues in rapid fashion, and the BGP chapters cover the relevant details with a solid structure and a clear vision. After the topics are covered, the authors include five strong practice labs to challenge the candidate's study and knowledge. If the BGP chapters weren't worth the price tag themselves, these five labs add even more value for those pursuing the CCIE certification. Like the individual topic labs, these full "test" labs are written in a manner that can be adapted to a minimalist's home lab or a full complement of routers as outlined in the prestaging sections. My first time through the book (with the practice labs postponed until later) took only two nights, and left me re-energized in my studies. Without tying up the reader with review of topics from Volume I or material found in other common titles, the authors get very deep on topics without making assumptions of the little things. No book (or editor?) is perfect, but the authors found a strong team of reviewers to give it their best shot. There's a minimum of errors and typos throughout the book, above the average for the twenty books I've read in the past six months. If you're pursuing the CCIE leather jacket or fortifying your production network, this book is a welcome addition to your library. My only hope is that MPLS doesn't end up on the Routing & Switching exam (or the authors cover that topic soon)!
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