Cisco Certification: Building Your Own Home Lab, Part I

CCNAs and CCNA candidates hear it all the time: 'Get some hands-on experience'. From my private encounter climbing the Cisco certification ladder, I can tell you firsthand that there is no understanding like hands-on studying. No simulator in the world is going to give you the expertise you will get cabling and configuring your personal routers.

Whenever I mention this to a single of my students, they usually say it fees too a lot. The truth is, it is less costly now to create your own CCNA and CCNP lab than it has ever been. The secret? Utilized routers.

The word 'used' turns off a lot of consumers not various of us order utilized computers or applied servers. Cisco routers, even though, are robust I personally personal a Cisco 4000 router that I use as a Frame Relay switch in my lab that I've had for about 4 years, and I've never had a problem with it.

The beneficial news for existing CCNA and CCNP candidates interested in making their personal labs is that utilized Cisco gear has under no circumstances been a great deal more plentiful or more affordable. eBay is a fine way to get an idea of what's out there and what the prices are, but you do not have to assemble your lab 1 piece at a time. Lots of eBay vendors who sell employed Cisco gear sell prepared-created CCNA and CCNP labs for a single price, including cables.

I asked one main vendor of CCNA and CCNP labs, , what the most standard concerns are relating to developing your own home lab. Here's what they had to say:

Why do I require actual routers instead of a simulator?

You want a physical router as the simulators just do not have the capacity to give you the 'hands on' you require to see what happens when you disconnect a cable or put a cable in the wrong place. You will come to obtain rather swiftly that blunders you make on Router 1 are affecting Router five all considering you did not screw in a cable properly. No simulator can simulate that.

How a number of routers do I desire?

Two routers actually are essential to see if something works. If you have a very limited spending budget, you can obtain value from only buying a single router over working with a simulator. Nevertheless, you will not be able to see the principal issue we are trying to achieve. The propagation of route tables! The only way you can see if your configurations perform, is to have at least two routers. Consequently, I strongly advocate that you invest in a dual router kit that comes with all the accessories you require. Otherwise you can devote days attempting to find all the little additional pieces you have to have to get your lab up and running.

Do I desire a switch?

Nicely, it is good to have. Still, with only about 2 questions on the test dedicated to 'hands on' switch understanding, if you have to skimp on some thing, skimp on the switch.

What routers and switches ought to I decide to purchase?

Possibilities, alternatives, possibilities! Which 2500/2600 router do I choose? I will list some pros and cons of each router beneath, along with current costs (note that rates are frequently lower if you decide to purchase a dual router kit instead of a single router):

1) Cisco 2501 Router with 16 MB Flash/16MB DRAM $94.99. The least expensive introduction router, and it can assistance a vast majority of the commands that you will require to learn for your CCNA test. All 2500 routers that we will talk about come with a minimum of two serial ports and an Ethernet port. You will need to add a transceiver to this unit to convert the Ethernet AUI port to an RJ-45 style Ethernet port.

2) Cisco 2503 Router with 16 MB Flash/16MB DRAM $119.99. This is the identical as a Cisco 2501, except it adds an ISDN port so you can full all your ISDN commands for the CCNA test. You will desire to add a transceiver to convert the Ethernet AUI port to an RJ-45 style Ethernet port.

three) Cisco 2505/2507 with 16 MB Flash/16MB DRAM $109.99. The exact same as a Cisco 2501 except it has a built-in 8 or 16 port hub so you do not have to acquire a transceiver.

four) Cisco 2514 Router with 16 MB Flash/16MB DRAM $149.99. This router is the same as a Cisco 2501 except instead of one Ethernet port you have two. You may well ask, what is the massive deal? Well, you can use this as your Cable Modem/DSL Modem router. Now you can test your capability to setup a firewall and router in a live atmosphere on the Internet. Lots of fun! You will want to add two transceivers to convert the Ethernet AUI ports to an RJ-45 style Ethernet ports.

five) Cisco 2520 Router with 16 MB Flash/16MB DRAM $119.99. This is the very same as a 2503 but it also adds two much more serial ports so you can use this as a frame relay switch later in your CCNA scientific studies. It costs the same as a 2503, so this is a outstanding income saving tip.

6) Cisco 2612 Router with 32 DRAM and 8 MB Flash $199.99. This is a modular router in contrast to any of the 2500 series routers. So the big benefit of this is you can purchase added modules to add functionality such as far more serial ports, ISDN ports, Ethernet ports, WICs and such. Even so, due to the flexibility you will pay a bit additional. A single day it is a frame relay switch, the next it is your ISDN router. In the extended run it will be less expensive than getting a bunch of dedicated routers for every discipline you want to learn.

7) Cisco 1912 or 1924 Switch with Enterprise Software $109.99. This is a great low price switch.. The only draw back is it is a ten MB switch except for the two 100 MB uplink ports. Not a major deal considering that you have ten MB routers.

8) Cisco 2912 or 2924 Switch with Enterprise Software $249.99. This switch will run all the existing commands required for the test and is a complete 100 MB switch.

And need to you want to sell your lab after you full your certification, you can either negotiate a value with the vendor who sold it to you, or you can sell it yourself on ebay. It's my experience that 95% of candidates who earn their CCNA go on to pursue their CCNP inside a single year, though, so don't sell it too swiftly.

In the end, you spend only a few hundred dollars, and you acquire invaluable experience and expertise that will assist you both in your certification quest and your job performance. Having been there, I can tell you that you will find out substantially a great deal more from truly configuring and cabling your personal gear than you ever will from any simulation of the real thing.

To your success,