Anyone built the lab in the BSCI Cisco Press self-study book

Just wondering if anyone has ever bothered following the books labs/setup to the letter?

Looks like quite a lab with:

10 x 2811 with 1 WIC 2 A/S installed. 6 of these need 1 FE port and 1 serial port. 4 need 2 serial ports and 1 FE port. All need 12.4(4)T1 IOS.

1 x 3620 with NM-1E module and NM-8A/S module. 12.1 IOS. I think this will be acting as the frame switch.

1 x switch.

Seems like alot of equipment. Still I've raided one of our sites and come up with:

3 x 3600
2 x 3620
3 x 2500

I'd quite like to follow the books examples without having to adapt them too much. Just wondering how to do it with easily available equipment.

Going to have a look at the warehouse next week to see if there's any 2811s recovered from customer sites that I can borrow.

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Comments

Ferret999

You can get away with 3640 routers instead of the 2800 routers and you can use 26**xm routers as well. Hell you can even run most of it with 2600 or 2500 routers you just cannot do some of the IPv6 stuff with them. So it is not really that hard a lab to build.

dynamik

Ouch. I want to wrap up my CCNA and get to this sometime in the near future, but there's no way I'm going to be able to come up with ten 2811s. Could you get by with 26xxXMs, or do you need something specific to the 28xx series?

I like having my own equipment, but I might have to go the dynamips/dynagen route on this one...

I came across these blog posts a little while ago:

http://shouldhavegonewithcisco.com/2007/08/07/best-ccnp-lab-part-i/
http://shouldhavegonewithcisco.com/2007/10/24/best-ccnp-lab-part-ii/

Maybe they will have useful advice.

virusc

I am tring to make that lab at home.

I have currently

2 3640(128/32 ios12.4) both have nm-1FE and nm-4a/s installed.
1 3620 for frame switch with nm-8a/s, nm-1e

8 2500's (16/16) for the two pods.
2950 switch.
a few workstations.

so far it is working out with no issues.
The only thing I think the 2500's wont do for BSCI is ospf_v3. Anyone know of a IOS for 2500's that have OSPF_v3. is this possible. All other IPv6 is there as well as bgp4,is-is.

Really would like a expert to chime in and tell me what I won't be able to do/test with current BSCI because of the equipment I have.

Thanks,

dtlokee

virusc wrote:

The only thing I think the 2500's wont do for BSCI is ospf_v3. Anyone know of a IOS for 2500's that have OSPF_v3. is this possible. Thanks,

c2500-is-l.122-15.T17.bin has OSPFv3 and RIPng, but no IS-IS so you will need to flip between that and c2500-jk8os-l.122-1d.bin for the IS-IS part

virusc

thanks I will try that.

I assume from your post there is not 1 ios for 2500 that does both.

dynamik

dtlokee wrote:

c2500-is-l.122-15.T17.bin has OSPFv3 and RIPng, but no IS-IS so you will need to flip between that and c2500-jk8os-l.122-1d.bin for the IS-IS part

Interesting. Are all features not included due to memory/cpu limitations or are there other practical reasons why you wouldn't want all features in one IOS? Do newer IOSes designed for newer systems incorporate all the older features?

dtlokee

Flash limitation I would assume. The 2500's can only have 16mb of flash.

larkspur

i had a problem with the grocery list also. I would love to have the hw in my lab but the reality is....

My strategy was to use

core
3620 4 serial int 2 Fe as the frame switch or MPLS Core

edge
1 - 1841
2 - 2600xm
2 - 2620

and use loopback interfaces to study the routing topics and labs of the BSCI.

JohnDouglas

Got my skeletek rack thing now (impressive piece of kit) and have started racking up the devices. All very exciting. Managed to get a nice 2950 on ebay for a good price on christmas day too

So, it seems my 3 x 3640 and 2 x 3620 are pretty ancient and have little memory.

What's teh lowest amount of memory I need to run 12.3 (i guess this requires less memory for much the same feature set) and 12.4? For the 3620 I should be able to borrow a few 32mb - 128mb flashdisks from the boss. But might find it harder laying my hands on 128mb ram.

I'll research 7200s tomorrow - does anyone think they'd be better? Only reason I ask is I'll find it alot easier to get hold of the PAs for 7200s than I will any of the modules for the 3600s. I should be able to borrow a three or so 7200s.

Thanks for any help.

IOS (tm) 3600 Software (C3640-I-M), Version 11.3(10)T, RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc1) ROM: System Bootstrap, Version 11.1(20)AA2, EARLY DEPLOYMENT RELEASE System image file is "flash:c3640-i-mz.113-10.T", booted via flash
cisco 3640 (R4700) processor (revision 0x00) with 49152K/16384K bytes of memory.

IOS (tm) 3600 Software (C3640-I-M), Version 11.3(10)T, RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc1) ROM: System Bootstrap, Version 11.1(20)AA2, EARLY DEPLOYMENT RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc1)
System image file is "flash:c3640-i-mz.113-10.T", booted via flash
cisco 3640 (R4700) processor (revision 0x00) with 49152K/16384K bytes of memory.

IOS (tm) 3600 Software (C3640-I-M), Version 12.0(3c), RELEASE SOFTWARE ROM: System Bootstrap, Version 11.1(20)AA2, EARLY DEPLOYMENT RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc1)
System image file is "flash:c3640-i-mz.120-3c"
cisco 3640 (R4700) processor (revision 0x00) with 24576K/8192K bytes of memory.

IOS (tm) 3600 Software (C3620-I-M), Version 11.3(T1, RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc1)
ROM: System Bootstrap, Version 11.1(20)AA2, EARLY DEPLOYMENT RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc1)
System image file is "flash:c3620-i-mz.113-8.T1", booted via flash
cisco 3620 (R4700) processor (revision 0x81) with 24576K/8192K bytes of memory.

ROM: System Bootstrap, Version 11.1(20)AA2, EARLY DEPLOYMENT RELEASE SOFTWARE (fc1)
System image file is "flash:c3620-i-mz.113-8.T1", booted via flash
cisco 3620 (R4700) processor (revision 0x81) with 24576K/8192K bytes of memory.

JohnDouglas

Woohoo. boss has agreed i can have 4 x cisco 2811s

hopefully alot quieter than the 3640s. certainly smaller. hopefully the network stock inventory is correct!

bmauro

Congrats on the addition.

I actually just finished up "building" the lab from the book last night. The only difference is mine resides in Dynamips :P

Added another 1GB stick to my laptop (2GB total now) and now the "network" has a total of 10 3620 running 12.3 and one 7200 (frame switch).

JohnDouglas

yeah, i reckon i may go dynamips way as well at some point. or do a mixture of both of them.

JohnDouglas

Well, been really busy at work and haven't done any studying. But today I finally got hold of 4 x 2811 at work. combined with a switch and console server I now have the gear to study with. Will be able to build the lab in the ccnp bsci lab portfolio.

So, no excuses now ... don't want to be "all the gear, no idea". Time to start studying. Just powered one up, couldn't believe the noise. But pleased to see it has 12.4 IOS although it's a bit low on the memory side with 64mb. Might need to get a few modules for it I guess.

No time for labbing now, sounds like a 100 hairdryers - which is a bit tough on the neighbours.

qplayed

you can build a cheap lab with
4x3640's
2x 2611xm
have the
and if you have the $$
invest on a 2511 terminal server and a 2522 as a frame switch

i personally am liking dynamips/dynagen and gns3 combo
i use gns3 to build the topology and use dynamips/gen to work with. I suggest getting your hands on real routers and switches if you have the $$$ its a god investment, you can use it to build on to your ccie lab

qplayed

you can do with 6 routers and 1 2522 or 2523(FRS)

use the 2611 as your bbr1/2
and the 4 3640 for your pod