Learning Cisco ASA

I haven't done too much work with anything Cisco, I know I NEED to get myself involved more with Cisco products due to my position.

Does anyone know any good books or training to learn ASA's.

And while I'm on the subject, does anyone know any good books on Routers and switches? I have been looking into getting my own lab setup so that the "hands on" learning will be beneficial!

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QHalo

Amazon.com: Cisco ASA: All-in-One Firewall, IPS, Anti-X, and VPN Adaptive Security Appliance (2nd Edition) (9781587058196): Jazib Frahim, Omar Santos: Gateway

1100 pages of awesomeness.

Bl8ckr0uter

jamie.english wrote: »

And while I'm on the subject, does anyone know any good books on Routers and switches? I have been looking into getting my own lab setup so that the "hands on" learning will be beneficial!

Most CCNA books will be good starting points. Also google network warrior.

bertieb

+1 Thats a very good book. I haven't read it from cover to cover (its HUGE) but use it for reference and it's not let me down so far.

bwbecraft

QHalo wrote: »

Amazon.com: Cisco ASA: All-in-One Firewall, IPS, Anti-X, and VPN Adaptive Security Appliance (2nd Edition) (9781587058196): Jazib Frahim, Omar Santos: Gateway

1100 pages of awesomeness.

+1

I completely agree with you on this one. The book is GREAT! Anything you want to know how to config in the ASA, with step by step instructions. It sits on the shelf above my work computer.

vCole

QHalo wrote: »

Amazon.com: Cisco ASA: All-in-One Firewall, IPS, Anti-X, and VPN Adaptive Security Appliance (2nd Edition) (9781587058196): Jazib Frahim, Omar Santos: Gateway

1100 pages of awesomeness.

Thank you for posting this!

Paul Boz

Cisco DocCD.

jamesp1983

QHalo wrote: »

Amazon.com: Cisco ASA: All-in-One Firewall, IPS, Anti-X, and VPN Adaptive Security Appliance (2nd Edition) (9781587058196): Jazib Frahim, Omar Santos: Gateway

1100 pages of awesomeness.

This is an excellent book. That book coupled with on the job experience will certainly strengthen your skills.

chrisone

CCNP Security - FIREWALL Exam

FIREWALL Official Certification Exam Guide - Due 2011

SteveO86

I've got that same firewall book, definitely a great a read for anything ASA related. If you have ASA to play around with while you go through the book you can get very familiar with the ASA very quickly.

Turgon

QHalo wrote: »

Amazon.com: Cisco ASA: All-in-One Firewall, IPS, Anti-X, and VPN Adaptive Security Appliance (2nd Edition) (9781587058196): Jazib Frahim, Omar Santos: Gateway

1100 pages of awesomeness.

Been considering buying this for a while. Do you know any books that cover FWSM well particularly recent versions of the IOS.

DevilWAH

i am sure you are aware. but just in case, remember you can now run cisco ASA in GNS3. great for practice.

creamy_stew

DevilWAH wrote: »

i am sure you are aware. but just in case, remember you can now run cisco ASA in GNS3. great for practice.

When did this happen? Which images are supported?

This is less than six degrees of awesome!

edit: Um, whatever that means

mikej412

creamy_stew wrote: »

When did this happen? Which images are supported?

It was announced November 28th, 2009 when the QEMU integration was announced.

There was the original PEMU solution running the PIX image using QEMU. So with the QEMU support added to GNS3, it became a GNS3 option. Same with the QEMU JUNOS option for Juniper Emulation.

The information should be on the GNS3.net web site (you may need to look for PIX instead of ASA). And there are probably some tutorial videos on Blindhog.net that are worth watching if you're going to attempt this.

But you're on your own to find a supported image file since there are software piracy issues (if you don't already have the software) -- and vendor licensing issues (even if you do have a PIX/ASA device and access to the image files).

mrblackmamba343

Cisco ASA Firewall Fundamentals eBook Tutorial Guide

This book is not a "study guide" it is real life implementation of ASA. It comes with screen shots and network diagrams and real world scenarios of all kinds of VPN config. Site-to-site, Remote access and SSL VPN (anyconnect)

DevilWAH

mikej412 wrote: »

It was announced November 28th, 2009 when the QEMU integration was announced.

There was the original PEMU solution running the PIX image using QEMU. So with the QEMU support added to GNS3, it became a GNS3 option. Same with the QEMU JUNOS option for Juniper Emulation.

The information should be on the GNS3.net web site (you may need to look for PIX instead of ASA). And there are probably some tutorial videos on Blindhog.net that are worth watching if you're going to attempt this.

But you're on your own to find a supported image file since there are software piracy issues (if you don't already have the software) -- and vendor licensing issues (even if you do have a PIX/ASA device and access to the image files).

You can use a full ASA image, (GNS3 0.7.2), the previous versions of GNS3 only ran PIX.

UPDATE: I have just checked and I have version 8.0.2 running in GNS3 right now

Here is the link on the GNS 3 site to get it up and running.. I found version 7 of the ASA image works fine, and some people have had issues with version 8.

But all works great as far as I can see. I have not done mmuch, jsut had the image up and running and put it in the back burner for when I am ready to do my CCSP.

Daniel333

90% of what I do on Cisco ASA's was covered in the CCNA Security curriculum. Grab yourself a couple Cisco 2621xm routers and toss the security feature set on there. And snag these two books. Even if you are not interested in the cert.

Honestly my favorite cert

Good reading -
Amazon.com: Implementing Cisco IOS Network Security (IINS): (CCNA Security exam 640-553) (Authorized Self-Study Guide) (978158705815

: Catherine Paquet: Books

Lab Guide -
Amazon.com: CCNA Security Lab Manual (9781587132490): Cisco Networking Academy: Books: Reviews, Prices & more

The one thing not covered is SSL VPNs, but trust me. You can learn that in a couple hours.

Daniel333

I've also been day dreaming about this cert for a while

Cisco ASA Specialist - Career Certifications & Paths - Cisco Systems