At what point is Packet Tracer insufficient?

I currently have my CCNA and am beginning to prep for CCNP. I'm curious at what point packet tracer will not be robust enough to cover the material. At that point gns3 will be used of course but I love that I can program switches with packet tracer. Hopefully it's just a couple topics that packet tracer lacks on but I'm curious as what point the virtualization lacks the functionality. Thanks everyone!

Also posted in CCNA thread but thought it would be better served here.

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Comments

VinnyCisco

I answered this in the CCNA forum as well:

After CCNA. That is just my opinion. Packet Tracer lacks commands used in the CCNP ROUTE track. Also functionality is lacking, such as not being able to form iBGP neighbors. Only eBGP is supported. Same with switch. Lacks commands and functionality. Right now I am in the ROUTE studies, and I am using GNS3 exclusively. It has helped me well. Once I move into SWITCH and TSHOOT, I will be going to real gear.

Scorp6

Awesome! Thank you so much for the info. That's kind of what I was assuming.

hitmen

what real gear is needed? Is it possible to do switch with gns3?

Scorp6

I know with the version I have its not. Literally just drag and drop switches, nothing else. I did hear the next version will have it thought.

Vask3n

From what I've seen/used, PT is basically useless for anything past CCENT mostly due to a ton of unsupported commands.

Scorp6

hitmen wrote: »

what real gear is needed? Is it possible to do switch with gns3?

I found this article on switching in GNS3 which is pretty helpful. All of the CCNA items seem to be possible but I don't know enough about CCNP material to tell if those items are possible.

The God

Packet tracer is good for mostly everything covered in the CCNA curriculum, and can also cover a few CCNP topics such as HSRP and layer 3 switching.

VinnyCisco

Vask3n wrote: »

From what I've seen/used, PT is basically useless for anything past CCENT mostly due to a ton of unsupported commands.

Totally Disagree. I used Version 6 and it had mostly everything I needed to pass both ICND1 and ICND2 tests. Since I could not run lab situations at my IT shop, I needed Packet Tracer for all my labs. I used it at work and at home and it had everything you can ask for on a CCNA Level for studying the test and running solutions.

However, once you go beyond CCNA, Packet Tracer is not an option.

Scorp6

VinnyCisco wrote: »

Totally Disagree. I used Version 6 and it had mostly everything I needed to pass both ICND1 and ICND2 tests. Since I could not run lab situations at my IT shop, I needed Packet Tracer for all my labs. I used it at work and at home and it had everything you can ask for on a CCNA Level for studying the test and running solutions.

However, once you go beyond CCNA, Packet Tracer is not an option.

I agree that packet tracer is sufficient for CCNA. Almost better for me because of the lack of switch function in gns3. I used packet tracer 5.3 exclusively for my CCNA. It is worth noting, however, that I took it before the changes in September 2013.

her.yang

Eventually you'll have to use real equipment when you start studying for the CCNP exams. It can do pretty much everything you need for the CCNA but in order to use some of the more obscure features, such as private VLANs, you'll need real switches.

alan2308

hitmen wrote: »

what real gear is needed? Is it possible to do switch with gns3?

It should get you through ROUTE, but you'll need switches for SWITCH. A good system running GNS3 and a few physical switches will get you by.

The next debate is which model switches and how many.