ccie voice lab setup

warquezho

Hi Eveyone!

I just want to ask if it is still ok to buy 28xx series routers for ccie voice lab studies? The reason I ask this is because I'm afraid that v4 of the lab might come in the following months and it might require the at least the 29xx series routers which I found very expensive considering the VWIC2 and HWIC-2T cards for pstn and frame relay

As for my setup I have the following at my disposal at the moment

[HQ] - 2811 with vwic-2mft-t1
[PSTN] - 1760 with vwic-2mft-t1, vwic-2mft-e1 --> Is 1760 just fine for a PSTN simulator?
[FRAME RELAY] - 3640 with nm-4t
BR1 - ?
BR2 - ?

So as you can see, only now need the BR1 and BR2 routers, also I only have a 3550 poe switch at my disposal right now, is it required to have a 3560 switch for QoS topics?? And any news on when the v4 might come as well as its hardware requirements?

Thanks,

skinsFan202

I think an update has to be coming soon since they're almost on CUCM 9.X With new features like SAF mixed with RSVP for CAC, I think you'll start to see the H.323 gatekeeper stuff go away. However, any update most likely won't be announced until the next cisco live in the summer and even then they'll usually give about 6 months cushion so for 2012 at least you should be good with 2800 series.

I consolidated PSTN & FR into one single router. BR1 & BR2 can also be 2811s if you can afford, but I've got mine as 2801s.

3750s are used in the actual lab. There are a few differences between 3750 & 3550 is 3550 does not support ingress queue manipulation as there is only one FIFO while the 3750 does; 3550 only supports egress queue manipulation. Also 3550's priority queue is assigned to queue 4 while on the 3750 the priority queue is assigned to queue 1. I think you'd be fine sticking with the 3550 but make sure you rent some time on a 3750 before you go for the lab