Advice on what to buy, what is worth what, and so forth

Greetings.

I realize that there is already another thread about being "new to cisco and what do I get," and this is one of those, but I had some other questions, too.

Do all Cisco routers have their IOS in a form that can be upgraded without much issue?
If I get a "tiny" router (one of the 1721's I believe), is it going to be any different than a 3500(?) series as far as functionality is concerned? Do I get "more" out of "more" as far as the learning and home network functionality is concerned?

I know that "Lab kits" are a waste of money, but I also do not want to wind up missing equipment.

As far as I know:
I need a router with a W1-T or W2-T card.
I want fast ethernet switches, because I would be going live with this on my home network.
I need an OOB modem, but don't know 'what' to get.
I don't know what cables I need.
I don't know if I need anything more than just the router and switch.
I am assuming I need multiples of both.

Signed,

AnotherCiscoNoob.

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Comments

Jon_Cisco

I am pretty new to Cisco myself. I decided to get 2 routers and 2 switches so I would have a solid starting point. That was 3 months ago and so far I am still using mostly packet tracer and GNS3 to get use to the interfaces. I am a firm believer in working on real equipment but you wont need it to start.

I think I started with the 2610xm routers because they were capable of running the 14 IOS but I don't know if they would run 15.
I am considering purchasing a layer 3 switch and a 1841 router in the next couple months as I get more into the hands on labs.

I know this does not answer your questions but don't rush the equipment. Figure out how you are gonna study and buy pieces as you need them and they are cheap. You will figure out the cables you are missing as soon as you try to connect the equipment. That not a good answer either but patience is your friend here. The mistakes you make are part of the process.

Good Luck

RouteMyPacket

How far do you want to take this? CCNP?

I would recommend you leverage Packet Tracer/GNS3 as these are more than enough to complete your CCNA. I would then suggest buying equipment that will carry you through CCNP. The hardware varies from throughput, features and IOS versions.

Switches: 2950 (L2), 3550 (L3), 3560 (L3, needed for CCNP features)

Routers: 2600XM, 1841, WIC-2T cards

Some others can chime in on routers, I prefer the 1841's but make sure you have 256DRAM and at least 64MB Flash to support ios v15

Castillian

Can those routers do ipsec VPN, and do they have firewalls like the PIX? Can I configure them to work with no-ip?
Before I jump into anything I just want to make sure that the hardware is good enough to both learn on, and last a long time while doing everything it needs to do.
How do I get a hold of a newer IOS if the routers don't have it?

Corndork2

They definitely can.

I recommend the 1841 with maxed RAM and Flash, or a 2801 / 2811. Those are all right at the $100 mark. If you want to spend a little more, the 2821 has more PPS throughput and gigabit interfaces. The 2821 will also do 15.2T+.

Just as RouteMyPacket (awesome name) said, you'd want to get equipment that takes your through CCNP. Otherwise, simulation tools may be a better fit.

f0rgiv3n

I agree with RouteMyPacket. You don't need too much equipment to accomplish what you need. Try out GNS3 and start practicing on there to get yourself going on routers. The switches wont' work on GNS3 because they use ASICS which are hardware based chips so they cannot be virtualized. That's why you'll need to get yourself a couple of real switches in order to get hands on experience with them.

RouteMyPacket

I agree with everyone who agrees with me as well. Here here!

Castillian

My end objective is in fact a total certification in Cisco. All of them. Pushing through to CCNP first, then to Sec and Voice afterwards.

What switches have gigabit ethernet ports?
I run gigabit at home, I do a lot of data transfers (especially lately). Whenever I have a machine go belly up, I transfer all files to the main server over the network. Gigabit ethernet is kind of a requirement. 1TB takes 8+ hours already. I don't want it taking days.

So 1841 Router with a WIC2T and 2600XM.

Layer 2/3 Switches with gigabit ethernet?

colby_ar

You have to have some deep pockets for L3 1Gb switches from Cisco. I believe you have to make the jump up to the 3650/3850 lines, which are quite expensive even on eBay.

I would recommend building a lab separate from your home network for several reasons:
1. You can use cheaper equipment models which are still capable of all of the features you will be tested on.
2. Hopefully you will be breaking and subsequently fixing your lab configs on a regular basis and you don't want this affecting your home network.
3. Enterprise network equipment can be noisy and quite annoying if you have them in a home office.

Castillian

That's a valid point.

Alright, so in that case, I guess I can pick up a second unmanaged gigabit switch as a shoe-in.

I still want to set up a legit Cisco router so I can do IPSEC VPN. PPTP is too unsecure for my tastes.

I suppose I can just have a single link pipe over to the lab from my home network.

Or if I go with a WIC2T card on my main router, one of those can plug into a cisco switch and the other to my unmanaged switch?

Would that work?

networker050184

Castillian wrote: »

Or if I go with a WIC2T card on my main router, one of those can plug into a cisco switch and the other to my unmanaged switch?

No, the WIC2T has serial ports and you need ethernet connections to your switches.

colby_ar

The WIC2T module is for serial interfaces, not ethernet. The router you buy will likely have two built-in (fast) ethernet ports on it, one for WAN and one for LAN. Unless you are planning on doing some sort of router-on-a-stick lab, this should be enough as you can connect your home switch to the router and then trunk your Cisco lab switch to your home switch.

If you want more interfaces on your router (assuming you get something modular), you can add an additional fast ethernet port with a card such as the HWIC-1FE or an etherswitch module such as the HWIC-4ESW.

RouteMyPacket

Castillian wrote: »

My end objective is in fact a total certification in Cisco. All of them. Pushing through to CCNP first, then to Sec and Voice afterwards.

What switches have gigabit ethernet ports?
I run gigabit at home, I do a lot of data transfers (especially lately). Whenever I have a machine go belly up, I transfer all files to the main server over the network. Gigabit ethernet is kind of a requirement. 1TB takes 8+ hours already. I don't want it taking days.

So 1841 Router with a WIC2T and 2600XM.

Layer 2/3 Switches with gigabit ethernet?

Go check pricing for your Gig switches then come back here and ask for other options. lol No way and for no reason does anyone "need" Gig access ports in their lab

Castillian

I was looking at a permanent usage aspect. Simply having them BE my home network after I've finished the learning process. I try to take the long view.

colby_ar

I think all of us have dreamed at one time or another about running top end enterprise class hardware on our home networks. What you are reaching for is, I believe, beyond practical.

A Cisco 3650 switch (what I believe is the lowest end all gigabit switch that Cisco sells) is a very high performance switch, but that performance is designed for scaling out a large enterprise network. I'm not sure that you could pick one up used for less than $2000. Is that kind of price tag really worth it when you consider that a $50 unmanaged switch would likely have near identical transfer rates in a small home network? A 1Gb NIC card is only going to transfer at a max of 1Gb, no matter how high end your switch is. What you are paying for in these managed L2/L3 Cisco switches is configuration and management features which simply aren't needed in such a low device count network.

For a lab capable of practicing configuring and troubleshooting CCNA level topics you are going to need at least two routers and three switches. To carry forward for CCNP topics you are going to need even more routers and layer 3 switches. This type of equipment is quite large when compared to home network equipment, very noisy, and a bit power hungry. You will quickly realize why businesses put this type of equipment in isolated network closets and server rooms. I promise that you will want equipment that you can put out of the way and turn off when not in use.

Having a separate lab is also important for learning purposes. In order to remember some of the complicated configurations possible in the Cisco work you will need to configure, break, troubleshoot, rinse, lather, repeat your lab network many times. Configuring a simple home network once simply isn't going to cut it and you aren't going to want to break your home network on a regular basis.

I strongly recommend that you get your feet wet with Packet Tracer and GNS3 before you invest in lab equipment. It will give you a much better idea of what you need and why you need it.

alxx

You don't want to use your home lab for your home internet connection if you live with others or your girlfiend family etc
as they will get really pissed off if they can't access the net when they want.

Keep your lab seperate so you can do what you want with it when you want.

When you can configure equipment and are decent at it, lease some rack time on a high end lab if you want to try high end equipment.

Plus one on using gsn3 and packet tracer and get a couple of cheap routers and switches to get familiar with real equipment - but don't go crazy.
You need to know packet tracer as thats the same as whats used in the exams.

see
Pricing for #CCNA Lab Switches | Wendell's CCENT Skills Blog

Also don't depend on others to tell you what to buy.
Part of the learning experience is learning how to research stuff and reading up on capabilities and finding out
whats available for a decent price.

If cheap equipment can do 90 -95 % of whats needed for ccna and ccnp and you can rent racktime (10 - 20 hours) for the other bit
don't waste your money buying high end equipment now as the ccnp may get revised before you get to it and avoids
having equipment sitting there unused.

Hardware get updated every few years and things change.

Things like cisco 1000v virtual switches that can plug into vcenter.

If you want to spend money now, better to get a decent pc/server to run gsn3 and virtual machines plus a few end devices (like raspberry pi's, media pc, apple tv , nuc etc). Having plenty of ethernet ports on a pc comes in very handy (multiple pci/pcie quad cards + motherboard with 2 builtin + few usb to ethernet) but wait until ccnp.

Take your time buying equipment, don't rush.
Make a list research whats available , what the capabilities are (ipv6 etc) , whats needed for ccna, ccnp, ipsec , voip etc and what to avoid (anything that can't be expanded or isn't modular).

Wendell Odoms site comes in handy
CertSkills, LLC > Home

Castillian

How do I get my hands on packet tracer?
I tried.
Even contacted Cisco "customer support."

"Where do I find a download link for packet tracer?" I asked.
He linked me to the knowledge base.

I informed him that I could not find what I was after--which is why I was contacting support.
He linked me to the knowledge base again.

Must be an easy customer service job. All you have to do there is throw a link to everybody who asks a question.

colby_ar

Technically you are only supposed to get it if you attend a Cisco Network Academy course. Cisco likes to hide all of the good stuff. But if you just happened to type "Cisco Packet Tracer 6.0.1" into Google... *wink*

Castillian

I see what you did there Colby.
Say no more. Say no more.

alxx wrote: »

You don't want to use your home lab for your home internet connection if you live with others or your girlfiend family etc
as they will get really pissed off if they can't access the net when they want.

I'd still have a separate home lab.
I want a one-time setup with a Cisco Router so that I can use the IPSEC VPN outside of the firewall.

Speaking of which, would you guys happen to know about Server 2008 R2 and VPN?
I've opened up the proper ports in the windows firewall and in the router firewall.
Can't VPN except for PPTP.

Not sure what I'm doing wrong. Don't have the information readily accessible at the moment, but if there are any guides of how to do the domain name bit through ddns that would be awesome.

Right now, my main domain is forwarding to a no-ip domain, and my ddwrt is using it as a keep-alive.
Odd thing though. I can only use the domain access on my server itself. It locked out the router IP address. But I can VPN and get an IP on local net and log in with RDC.

It's all sorts of weird. It works but its broken.

colby_ar

IPSec/L2TP can be a bit fickle about servers behind a NAT. I've never had much luck with it at least. You might do a search for NAT-T as this is an extension to the protocol that is supposed to allow VPN servers behind a NAT.

Castillian

Its giving me problems even with a direct IP.
Buddy of mine and I have been working on it. We were up until 5am Sunday and didn't realize it.

On the other hand, I have packet tracer running. Couldn't download it on the wireless here at work, but hey, that pptp vpn comes in handy. Remote into home server, run it on home server. Hurrah.

Do you know of any scenarios that I can download?

edit:

So... is Packet Tracer a free program? Is there licensing involved? Was wanting to get it installed on my work machine.

colby_ar

Do a search for "packet tracer labs" and you should come up with something.

If you have a Kindle or the Kindle app, I can't recommend 101 Labs for the Cisco CCNA Exam enough. I went through most all of them and I can't think of any that I wasn't able to build out in PT. I also used PT to recreate the lab from the INE videos and was able to follow along without many adjustments.

Technically Packet Tracer is not free as it is meant to go with the Cisco Network Academy courses. That said, however, Cisco does not charge for the product and doesn't seem to make much effort to take down sites that offer it for download.

Castillian

Yeah... picked up the book on Kindle for $5!

(95% off right now for digital)

What a steally deal.

Ran into a problem with Lab #3.

I can't figure out how to configure FE0/1 between SW1 and SW2 as 802.1q.
I found an 802.1p cos option, but it didn't seem to do anything.

Would you have any advice for that one?