CCNP Equipment

Kaminsky

Not sure this has been posted before but I found this very detailed discussion on CCNP equipment from Odum's blog on Network world. Thought I would post it here just in case.

http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/27576

Netwurk

Very cool link. I get the magazine (it's a freebie) and browse their website and I never saw that.

Seems to be a lot of debate in the article about whether or not you need a 3550, and they only include them in the $5000 uber lab. For what it's worth, last month I got a 3550-24 for $400 shipped and earlier this year (July) I got one for $500. So the prices are going down since that article.

The experience gained from L3 switches is important, but I agree with Odom that you get by without them.

Kaminsky

BUT
£1k to get a L2 3550 to a L3 3550 is a little harsh for an IOS patch considering it's for a home lab (as recommended).... and then only IF you origionally got the switch straight from Cisco in the first place, apparantly.... no wonder so many are seriously looking at Juniper.

Is there a real benefit to letting the switch do the routing or is it more sensible (and cost effective) to just pass it up to a router or is this some sort of weird oddity ?

dtlokee

Kaminsky wrote:

BUT
£1k to get a L2 3550 to a L3 3550 is a little harsh for an IOS patch considering it's for a home lab (as recommended).... and then only IF you origionally got the switch straight from Cisco in the first place, apparantly.... no wonder so many are seriously looking at Juniper.

Is there a real benefit to letting the switch do the routing or is it more sensible (and cost effective) to just pass it up to a router or is this some sort of weird oddity ?

Yeah because Juniper gives all of their stuff away for free

All 3550s are L3, it is a difference of IP base or IP services which is an upgrade in software.

Paul Boz

L3 switch is definitely worth the purchase for a lab if you plan to move onto the CCIE. I felt that the CCNP was heavy on L3 switching because it is a very popular technology now.

tiersten

Kaminsky wrote:

Is there a real benefit to letting the switch do the routing or is it more sensible (and cost effective) to just pass it up to a router or is this some sort of weird oddity ?

A router that can route at wirespeed between multiple ports will cost way more.

gorebrush

I picked up TWO C3550's BOTH with the EMI for £700.

Bargain, I thought!

Kaminsky

gorebrush wrote:

I picked up TWO C3550's BOTH with the EMI for £700.

Bargain, I thought!

Nice GB. Those 3 I got out of the skip were all L2. Still good though. They threw another one this week which I "intercepted" but again, L2.

gorebrush

Kaminsky wrote:

gorebrush wrote:

I picked up TWO C3550's BOTH with the EMI for £700.

Bargain, I thought!

Nice GB. Those 3 I got out of the skip were all L2. Still good though. They threw another one this week which I "intercepted" but again, L2.

When you say, L2, you mean SMI, right?

I heard you can get the images from Cisco for free - though you'd need a login.

Router images require a SmartNet contract I believe.

Though i'm sure if your "creative", you can get switch images on the internet.

dynamik

Yea, that's just a software difference, right?

tiersten

gorebrush wrote:

I heard you can get the images from Cisco for free - though you'd need a login.

Router images require a SmartNet contract I believe.

Switches and routers both require a SmartNET contract now. They did say that they track downloads of the non base versions of the switch IOS as well.

Netwurk

You can upgrade any 3550 to the EMI image by loading up the EMI IOS. As with all software, businesses should make sure that they are properly licensed to do so.

Home labbers are not a business. They'll do things like install a Windows 2003 120-day trial on their server, which is perfectly legal to do. You learn what you can, then maybe tear it down and install Unix BSD. Then you might mirror that install, throw the raid disk on the shelf, and then load up Windows 2008. And so on and so on.

With Cisco IOS software, there are no free trials that I know of. So you work with the images you have on your TFTP server. Load 'em up, tear 'em down, whatever.

This thread started with a Network World article, so here's another which discusses the pros and cons of Smartnet:

http://www.networkworld.com/community/?q=node/12522

gorebrush

tiersten wrote:

gorebrush wrote:

I heard you can get the images from Cisco for free - though you'd need a login.

Router images require a SmartNet contract I believe.

Switches and routers both require a SmartNET contract now. They did say that they track downloads of the non base versions of the switch IOS as well.

Time to get creative!

tiersten

gorebrush wrote:

tiersten wrote:

gorebrush wrote:

I heard you can get the images from Cisco for free - though you'd need a login.

Router images require a SmartNet contract I believe.

Switches and routers both require a SmartNET contract now. They did say that they track downloads of the non base versions of the switch IOS as well.

Time to get creative!

Yeah. Cisco say they keep track of downloads but I've never heard of anybody being caught. YMMV obviously.

Kaminsky

I've down loaded software from them recently and, the pages you go through felt like there was a black van about to turn up outside if I was bogus.


Back to the L3 3550 though. Is this really just an IOS ? Is there no bios upgrade to do it ?
(eyes his 3550s and his gold partner login)

malcybood

tiersten wrote:

Switches and routers both require a SmartNET contract now. They did say that they track downloads of the non base versions of the switch IOS as well.

Is this applicable to all routers? We bought a bunch of 877's recently through a reseller without a smartnet contract as we thought for these devices at the price we were getting them at it was a waste of money. We specifically asked for the smartnet contract to be removed from the proposal.

If one breaks we'll replace it. Although we do take smartnet on our ISR routers and ASA's