Benifits of investing in a home lab?

hbk

So I've been really considering in investing in a home lab. During my CCNA studies, all I used were GNS3 and PT.
I have no experience in the real networking world, plus I'm going for my CCNP next.
So with that, is this a good time to invest in a home lab, rather than just using the simulators? What are the pro's and con's of investing in a home lab?

Thanks TE!

shodown

Pro's

- Real Gear
- Learning IOS loads, dealing with rommon and TFTP issues
- Real Switching GNS3 is limited in this regard
- Some options like Voice are only available with real gear. You can't simulate the digital cards or DSP cards in simulators.

Cons

Space
Heating
Cost.

hbk

Thanks for the input shodown. The way I look at it is, if I stick to just the simulators, I'd be missing out on all the hardware component of networking such as cabling, swapping moduals, upgrading the ios image etc... But then again, the biggest barrier to that is the cost