Best Lab Router for the money

I an new to the IT field as well as the IT certification realm. I am currently studying for my CCENT and will be taking the exam very soon. What is the best and least expensive router that I can use to get me through my CCNA. It needs to have an IOS version that supports the SDM

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tiersten

Best depends on your budget. A 1721 is a decent router that supports 12.4 and SDM. If you've got more $$$ then a 2611XM is nicer and supports 12.4T and voice. If you've got even more $$$ than a 3640 with a selection of NMs and WICs would be even better. If you're loaded then you'd get an 1841 or 2811.

Bl8ckr0uter

tiersten wrote: »

Best depends on your budget. A 1721 is a decent router that supports 12.4 and SDM. If you've got more $$$ then a 2611XM is nicer and supports 12.4T and voice. If you've got even more $$$ than a 3640 with a selection of NMs and WICs would be even better. If you're loaded then you'd get an 1841 or 2811.

1721s are great (quit, cheap, and they support everything you need) BUT they are not rackable, which is important if you update you lab and want to go with a rack. I am thinking about my 1721s for this very reason.

CCIE Wanna Be

Thanks, I will check them out. Any idea on where the best place to shop for one is, I'm leaning towards the 2611XM

tiersten

You didn't say where you are.

eBay if you've got the patience and ability to find a good deal.

GT-Rob

the 2611 (non-xm) is probably the best bank-for-buck, as it comes with 2 interfaces, and they are dirt cheap (they can also be made to be very quiet). They only go up to 12.3 though, and take a lot of memory to get decent feature sets.

Darthn3ss

I like 2651's. I've found them for around $100 before and they can run 12.4. They also have 2 FE interfaces which is always nice.

Corndork2

Id go with the 26**XM series. You can find them for cheap on ebay and they do a lot of things. Plus they have 2 WIC and 1 NM slot

Forsaken_GA

Best deal for the money? 3640's. They'll do pretty much anything for all the various certification tracks, and they're pretty darn cheap.

I'm taking delivery today of a pair of 3640's that I found on ebay, max memory/flash, with an NM-2FE2W and 2 WIC-1T's, cost me about $150 each.

Bl8ckr0uter

Forsaken_GA wrote: »

Best deal for the money? 3640's. They'll do pretty much anything for all the various certification tracks, and they're pretty darn cheap.

I'm taking delivery today of a pair of 3640's that I found on ebay, max memory/flash, with an NM-2FE2W and 2 WIC-1T's, cost me about $150 each.

With the 3640s they are pretty much empty boxes and alot of sellers are charging big bucks (like 150-200 bucks) just for the boxes. Plus they are pretty big.

Forsaken_GA

knwminus wrote: »

With the 3640s they are pretty much empty boxes and alot of sellers are charging big bucks (like 150-200 bucks) just for the boxes. Plus they are pretty big.

They're empty boxes in the sense that they don't have any interfaces by default. There are basically two types of folks selling 3640's these days -

#1 The ripoff guys who are charging 150+ for a 3640 with no interfaces (and probably not even max memory/flash)

#2 The guys who understand that folks who buy them will want them to be useful, and bundle them with some sort of interface to that effect. How generous these sellers are in their bundling does vary.

As I mentioned, I picked up a pair of 3640's that were bundled with FastEthernet interfaces and serial interfaces with max memory and flash for $150 each. That's not the norm, of course, but good deals can be had if you keep your eyes open. If you intend to go beyond CCNA/CCNP as well, they're a very good purchase, as they're pretty much the lowest end option available for doing MPLS.

tha_dub

I picked up a 2611 (2 ethernet interfaces) on ebay for 50 bucks delivered to my door. I'd like it to have a little more ram but for $50.... I would recommend a really cheap, "do most things" router and then buy one more expensive do everything router.

networker050184

Grab a couple of these and you should be good to go for your home lab.

tiersten

networker050184 wrote: »

Grab a couple of these and you should be good to go for your home lab.

If you're a grandmother in Sweden then yeah you'd totally have that in your garden shed and use it to dry your tea towels

ilcram19-2

all you need is gns3

captobvious

ilcram19-2 wrote: »

all you need is gns3

You forgot to add with legal copies of IOS.