Praise God! What a Miracle.
I am now CISSP 2018 certified first attempt 150 questions with 13 odd minutes to spare!
I had initially scheduled this exam for the 8th August and then postponed it as I had only done 2911 practice exams in total and wanted to do more and hence rescheduled - the first date available was 15th and hence I took it.
Background 21 years work experience in IT and with more than 10 years in IT Security - this was a very important reason for my success
For the CISSP 2018, I reviewed the changes Luke posted and watched a few videos.
Study Materials 1. Sybex Official Study Guide - 7th edition - read it 3 times cover to cover - wrote my own notes and read from this a few times before the exam
2. Dan's notes
3. I did not use any Mindmaps and only glanced through Sunflower notes
4. Did not use Shon Haris books or any other books - I found Shon Haris to be very detailed for a management exam!!
Videos Kelly Handerhan videos on Cybrary - Entire series
Mike Chapple video - Entire series
Youtube videos to understand about CISSP and exam requirements in the early days
Luke's Videos - most of them were brilliant
Few select Youtube video on topics below: 1. General intro on CISSP and on exams ( first few days)
2. Common Criteria
3. Rainbow series and Orange Book
4. ECC Encryption
Audio Shon Haris - Heard it twice over although I did not read her books while on the road
Exam Preparation (totally 2,911 questions) 1. All questions from the Official study guide
2. All questions from Official Practice Tests
3. Mcgraw-Hill - All questions
4. CISSP Prep
5. Go Certify
6. CCCure - few questions
7. Udemy
Exam Week I did not spend more than 30 minutes in the whole week to prepare for the exam - prepared for a job interview till Tuesday and then prepared for a model on Thu. Fri and Sat as part of the interview process.
I was still able to pass by the Grace of God and because of the experience and understanding of the concepts - this is most important.
Exam Day Had about 6 hours sleep before the exam - was targeting 8 hours but this did not happen!
I stay in Dubai and the nearest exam centre was in Abu Dhabi and I had to drive more than 300 Kms up and down for the exam. Managed to reach the exam centre about 15 minutes before the scheduled exam start time !!
After I reached, they explained the process, took my signature, photographs, handprints and then I had kept my things in the locker before being led to the exam centre.
The centre was full with different exam takers and after a short prayer and thanksgiving I started the exam. The first 10 questions were OK - I wanted to get them all correct but I think by and large it was OK. After this when I reached 50 questions - it was shaky.
I took a deep breath and continued when it crossed 100 my confidence started growing, at 130 I felt more confident of passing and at 150 I was quite confident as most candidates I know of passed if they survived till 150.
I went out to get my results and the examiner printed and gave the result to me directly without looking and I was very happy and thanked God that I passed.
The questions were very tough and to pass you need to have solid understanding of the concepts and practical work experience.
Good luck and hope you found the post useful.
God bless.