Recommendations for a CCNP Lab ? 3

[justvistin]

Hi All,

I'm about to re-certify my CCNA, prior to commencing a BSCI course and was wondering if anyone could recommend a list of switches and routers to make up an approriate CCNP lab ?

I have some existing equipment (Cisco 2500's, a 2620, 2621, 3620 and a 2950 XL switch), but suspect that this could do with some upgrading as this is all left over from 3-4 years ago when I first sat my CCNA.

In particular, I'm trying to decide which switches to buy - the Cisco 3500's appear to be very cheap on eBay at the moment, but I'm not sure if these are up to the job or not?

Comments and opinions welcome - thanks for the help.

 

[CiscoGuy33]

justvistin,

Wendell Odom, CCIE and Cisco author had a blog at Network World on this very subject both setting up a CCNA and CCNP lab.

CCNA -

http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/24916

CCNP -

http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/40187

and

http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/27576

Read these over and then ask questions, you will find that with what you have, you have a good start on a lab.

I will say that the price of 2950's with the EI image are coming down on Ebay - under $100 in many auctions and regular 2950's are going for $30 to $40.

Hope this helps!


E.A. Broda
CCNA, CCDA, CCAI, Network +

 

[justvistin]

Thanks for the great link CiscoGuy. Read the blog end to end and signed up to the newsletter. Exactly what I was looking for (and more).

 

[burtsbees]

So give him one of them pink little star thingies there...

Burt

 

[nickstudy]

The best advice I can offer is I learned my lesson on purchasing equipment. I would suggest starting with the CCIE RS blueprint (That is if you are going RS) or going for whatever track you want (Security,Voice,RS etc) and working from there. The 3550's are no longer going to be valid come October due to Version 4.0 of the CCIE taking over. It will be only 3560's (some pricey equipment mind you!)

Visit cisco's site and look at the 4.0 the old (what is now current, until Oct 2009) uses the 3550's. So really, the 2950's and all the other switches are basically put out to pasture. Now you could go the "router on the stick" route, but if you really want to do it proper you might have to fork out some C notes to make it happen.

Here is what the current topology is according to internetworkexpert:

http://www.internetworkexpert.com/resources/ccierack.htm#ios

They still have the 3550's in the mix, but as I said those are going to be gone. The 3560's I know you will HAVE to have those. But the routers, as long as you can get the correct feature set you should be good. But also keep in mind you will want to have the IOS that cisco recommends - another tricky thing to get.

So while you may want to jump all over the ebay stuff and go buck wild on getting new equipment, take the time breathe and look at the big picture. This stuff gets expensive and you don't want to be caught with your pants down!

Good luck!

CCNA,MCSA,MCP,MCITP,MCTS,A+

http://WWW.NICHOLASGOLDEN.COM

Currently Doing CCNP then onto the CCIE R&S and VOICE!

 

[CiscoGuy33]

justvistin,

I will throw one more thing out there, since nickstudy made some good points on the cost of 3560's $$$$$$$$$$$.

Check the social networks like Facebook or Linkiden for others in your area that are working on CCNA, CCNP and CCIE and look into forming a "Cisco Study Group" and pool equipment and work together on building a killer rack and knocking off certs.

People do this in model railroading all the time - use one guys garage or basement and build a killer layout - why not a Cisco layout

Just some thoughts!!

E.A. Broda
CCNA, CCDA, CCAI, Network +

 

[nickstudy]

I just completed what is Cisco's Recommended Topology for the BSCI. I have a tendency to listen to cisco, if they recommend something I normally do it.

I posted the BSCI topology with some detailed explanations and cabling choices. It's mapped to Cisco's blueprint for the BSCI, but I explained a bunch of stuff on there.

Here is the link

http://nicholasgolden.com/page1.html

Doing a Coop is a good way to get hands on with equipment. I couldn't do it as I want to stare at my rack. I just got a 45u rack and filled it up with goodies. I have heard of people doing the sharing thing, but you could just get rack time for the equipment you need. In there is a problem too, I was going to do that and it's hard to book an 8 hour block of time, or a 4 hour block of time. If you are married, have kids or whatever you KNOW what I am talking about. Things come up life happens, so I like having my own rack.

I mean if you want to get a CHEAP start, you could buy a few 2501's for next to nothing (just looked they are 50 bucks buy it now) and the DCE cabes you would need 2, that's less than 20 bucks there. Total cost would be around 220 or so. That would get you going and you could do EIGRP, OSPF, run debugs and have a good ol' time. Of course it's nice to be able to just run with a plethora of 3640's with the 4 a/s in each one then you can have a frame relay cloud (or you can get the 2522 with 8 serial ports like I did - was 180 bucks off ebay) and have everything go through the cloud to test EIGRP how it routes through the cloud....

and on and on and on. I'll shut up now but really equipment is cheap these days, the 2501 even though it's bottom of the barrel it's got 12.3 and even though the CCNP uses 12.4 you can still do a TON of routing with just a few of those babies.

Good luck to all and thanks for listening to my rant!

CCNA,MCSA,MCP,MCITP,MCTS,A+

http://WWW.NICHOLASGOLDEN.COM

Currently Doing CCNP then onto the CCIE R&S and VOICE!

 

[CiscoGuy33]

nickstudy,

Welcome to our little corner of the Internet - nice posts!!!!

E.A. Broda
CCNA, CCDA, CCAI, Network +

 

[nickstudy]

Thanks!

CCNA,MCSA,MCP,MCITP,MCTS,A+

http://WWW.NICHOLASGOLDEN.COM

Currently Doing CCNP then onto the CCIE R&S and VOICE!

 

[nickstudy]

Justvistin. I re visited the list you provided and I would say you would be fine as far as the BSCI Is concerned

2500 (assuming you have 2)
2620
2621
2950


For the 2500's if they are 2501's then that's perfect. Those will server as the backbone router 1 and 2 (BB1 &BB2) that go into the "cloud" (frame-relay)

The cloud could be anything but I prefer the 2522 since it has 8 serial ports for WAN. If you are not ever going for CCIE then you could use a 3620 or 3640 with a 4/as on it and use that for the cloud.

R1 could be the 2620 and r2 could be the 2621. Assuming you have Wic 1t's for them or some kind of AS module on them that would be perfect for the 4 way frame relay.

The R3 and R4 on the bottom you could add 2 3640's

The 2620 and 2621 could be the

bb1 bb2
\ /
cloud
/ \
R1 R2
| |
R3 R4


bb1,2 r1,r2 all connected by serial links

r1 to r3 r4 to r2 are crossover

r3 to r4 are serial

That should do it gotta run wifes calling

CCNA,MCSA,MCP,MCITP,MCTS,A+

http://WWW.NICHOLASGOLDEN.COM

Currently Doing CCNP then onto the CCIE R&S and VOICE!

 

[lerdalt]

Just to add my $.02,
I saw on your webpage, recommending getting an Access server. I can't agree with that enough. I didn't have mine setup originally in my first version(s) of lab, but have it now, and love it. I'm also using the putty connection manager and built a database with pre-configured sessions to connect to each port on it. Nothing fancy but works great.

Something else I like to have at my disposal is a whiteboard. Found several places online for a DIY whiteboard if you are handy. I'd be lost without mine at work, and had to get a small one for home to. It's nice for if you want to reconfigure your lab for another purpose. I tend to do a lot of my testing for things at home than at work so I can avoid some of the distractions at the office.

Also, don't let yourself get stuck on just one design. It's great for the studies, but I think some of my better education came when I started making up my own scenarios and tried to make different things work.

More and more too, I've been setting up my end routers as dhcp servers so I can move my laptop around and not have to keep setting static IP addresses if I wanted to use it for pings.

 

[nickstudy]

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3642/3552604004_d9604dc465.jpg?v=0

Hey Lerdalt I agree with you.

I posted the link above as I got rushed earlier and the wife wanted to leave to go shopping and do stuff...

I just realized my little ascii art didn't cover it so I posted the above link to it instead.

I have 3 large whiteboards they are 4 foot by 5 foot tall each and then I have a smaller 12" by 16" whiteboard that I use when I am behind the rack. I have this 45U rack that is 7 foot tall and I have to roll out the rack to get behind it so I can't really go back and forth. With that said I say just attach a piece of paper, or a whiteboard and have it where you can get to it.

As you say, this whiteboard - I feel LOST without it!!!!!

You can work out in theory what you want the design to be for the day and draw it out. Sometimes you will see flaws and realize that one router should be elsewhere due to the availability of serial ports or whatever, or maybe you want a more powerful router that is handling the BGP stuff (a BIG topic on CCNP if you don't know alread) or whatever.

Good stuff, GOOD stuff. I love my 2511 access server, it's the BEST.

CCNA,MCSA,MCP,MCITP,MCTS,A+

http://WWW.NICHOLASGOLDEN.COM

Currently Doing CCNP then onto the CCIE R&S and VOICE!