Routers to buy for CCNP

Hello friends...I've a question to ask u all and any reply will be highly appreciated....I need to buy routers for my CCNP exams and I've a target to attaing CCNP(passing all 4 exmas) within 6 months....My CCNA is scheduled on June 20,2008....According to me,,,Boson's router simulator gives a good practice for CCNA commands but for my CCNP,I want to work on real routers...I've been through ebay and ciscokits.com sites to look for a CCNP router kit bundle but got confused at various choices....Can anybody suggest me the exact Cisco router and switch series I need to buy so that it just does the job for me to pass all 4 CCNP tests??i'm ready to go for used ones and my budget is around $ 400....Also,,,if anyone knows about a site other than ebay and ciscokits where I'n buy routers for less,,,please let me know....I'm ready to buy whole kit or seperately whatever comes cheap....Thanks a lottttt!!

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Comments

ccie_in_the_making

3560's and 2800's, thats what I used cuz we have them in the office, lol. I guess it depends on how much u want to spend. I suppose most people would say go with 2950's and 2600's but as long as they support all the necessary commands then you should be fine. Make sure it has some kind of security image on it for ISCW.

mikej412

Check the CCNP FAQ for some lab hardware ideas.

With your budget you'd probably want to look into using Dynamips/Dynagen for BSCI and save your money for one or two real routers (with the latest IOS -- that are also supported in Dynamips), at least 1 four port network card (or USB Ethernet Adapters) -- to link Dynamips with the real hardware and Switches.

ansh.onlyours

Thank you Mike and ccie_in_the_making for great ideas....But I'll be really very grateful to you if you could tell me the exact number of routers and switches of specific series I need to buy to earn my CCNP....for example,,,,2 2600 series routers,1 2500 series router and 1 2900 series switch is essential enough for cCNP preparation???if not,,,please give me idea for setting up a perfect CCNP lab(with used routers and switches)....Also,,,are there any other sites except ciscokits and ebay from where I can get it for cheap????.....Thanks a lotttttt for ur replies....

Peibol

Check this one too:

http://www.networkworld.com/community/odom

marco71

Why don't you use dynamips emulator with dynagen front-end ? both are free and all you need is a compatible IOS image

/LE sorry, didn't read in depth, mikej412 already recommend those

LBC90805

Yup and if you go the emulator route, pun intended, make sure you have a smoken fast computer with a lot of memory. Don't mess around with Vista for it is a pig, if you didn't know that already. XP or even Linux would be great. Keep extra processes that aren't mission critical from starting up.

ccie_in_the_making

I have never had any luck with Dynamips, it seems so complicated

. I would say a minimum of three routers to effectively see route filtering and redistribution at work. Two switches should also be fine, one should definitely be layer 3. As for the models any should work as long as they have the right feature set and interfaces.

I used a 2811, 2821, 3560, 3550 and a 6500. Over kill maybe

but that is what I have access to at wok.

CiscoCerts

ccie_in_the_making wrote:

I have never had any luck with Dynamips, it seems so complicated .

It's just like anything else you have to put in a little time to learn it. Not too bad. There is an easier option however! www.gns3.net it's a GUI for dynamips there are video tutorials over at www.blindhog.net to get you started.

Paul Boz

Use Dynamips and buy two cheap routers. Here's why.

Others have mentioned that Dynamips is difficult to use at first but I feel that if you put the time into learning how to install and operate it you will use it for the duration of your career (as long as it's possible at least). I own a decent home lab (several 3640's, 7206vxr, and a few lesser routers) but I use dynamips 99% of the time. You can map dynamips interfaces to real hardware interfaces and even incorporate your dynamips lab with your real hardware lab. In fact, if you want to get really fancy you can run several dynamips instances in different VMWare sessions and interface THEM together using real or virtual interfaces. As you can see, it's a very powerful tool.

You should, in addition to using dynamips, buy two cheap routers. If you don't have any experience with hardware you'll want to at least get some hands on. Do a basic password recovery through ROMMON, install a new IOS version, and maybe configure a small home network with your internet connection. You may also want some switches for the BCMSN but to be honest I only used one switch to study for the exam and did fine.