Spec me a cisco router?

[bgcb]REPO_MAN

[bgcb]REPO_MAN

[bgcb]REPO_MAN

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Ive got Virgin Media 120MB cable.

I want to get into cisco routers and connect it to my virgin box, and use the virgin box as jsut a modem.

Now, can someone recommend a cisco wireless/wired router that can handle this sort of connection speed, has IOS and is FANLESS??

I can see the 800 series, but they only do 15Mbps for christ sakes!!!
 
So you are wanting to have your virgin box acting as the modem? and this will connect to the cisco via an ethernet cable presumably to a FastEthernet or GigabitEthernet port? If so how would the 800 series be limiting you to 15mbps? surely it will give you 100mb full duplex speeds

I think if you wanted wireless aswel and want it rack mountable, you will be looking at two separate units, the router and a separate wireless access point.

For instance Cisco 892 K9 - £500 odd quid new and that looks like the wireless only does WEP encryption!
 
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DJMK4 said:
So you are wanting to have your virgin box acting as the modem? and this will connect to the cisco via an ethernet cable presumably to a FastEthernet or GigabitEthernet port? If so how would the 800 series be limiting you to 15mbps? surely it will give you 100mb full duplex speeds

I think if you wanted wireless aswel and want it rack mountable, you will be looking at two separate units, the router and a separate wireless access point.

For instance Cisco 892 K9 - £500 odd quid new
Click to expand...

Well... I thought that unit despite having a 100mb interface would be limited to 15Mb processing power.

Under the performance positioning on the Cisco 800series models comparison page, it has 15Mbps.

I dont mind two boxes to be honest, as long as they are both rackable, and fanless, as although I have a rack at home with a SAN and servers, everything has been done to keep the noise down to a minimum.

I even had the SAN enclosure power supplies reflashed with different firmware to lower the fanspeeds and quieten everything.

When it comes to Cisco, I am about as good as a woman with a map.. I have no clue about the range. I need something to learn IOS basically, and provide a "enterprise" interface including VPN stuff at home.

Since its going to be on 24/7/365 it needs to be silent, and low power.

Ive just plugged a 2811 series in at work, and its a bit of a screamer, so thats the 2800's out straight away.

Why does the Cisco page have so few models??

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/routers/ps380/prod_models_comparison.html

I cannot see the 892 you mention... whats the K9 ?

Thanks DJMK
 
K9 is a IOS version, basically you have standard IOS and enhanced K9 IOS which gives you more enhanced security features, if you are learning try and get hold of k9 firmware or a router with k9 firmware.

To be honest I am not sure if you would be better off with a router with FastEthernet ports or Gigabit Ethernet ports.

Thing is most routers that are designed for enterprise, have fans.

I configured a Cisco 1841 yesterday, this is a fanless unit but only has 2 x built in F/E ports, and 2 WIC slots for expansion.

Cisco 1921 has 2 x gigabit ethernet ports and looks fanless

If you are wanting to learn properly, wouldnt it be worth you buying a cheap lab set-up off ebay? you would get much more benifit out of learning rather that just buying a router to hook up to your internet connection as this doesnt give you much learning, it doesnt take long at all to configure your router to use on a connection.

By buying a lab set-up, or even learning virtually, you can learn proper switch set-up, VLAN's, router setup, routing, routing protocols etc etc etc that people study when looking at the CCENT or CCNA qualifications.
 
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Ah yes, but this would be the start of the lab so to speak.

I would bed myself in gently with a router, leave it running, do some advanced stuff on it. I.e setup a VMware view environment, and use the Cisco router for a DMZ, and have a View security server etc etc.

Then later on, i'll add in some more advanced cisco stuff down the line.

Right now I have a few 1810-24G HP switches trunked up and although not entirely enterprise, they do the trick for LACP trunked links and Vlans for the SAN traffic...

Your help is invaluable, I get the impression you know your Cisco stuff.

Since everything in the world almost is gigabit, why have Cisco even bothered with 10/100 ports in this day and age?

EDIT:- Looks like the 1921 has a fan! :((
 
FastEthernet is still more than capable to handle most things, what you got to remember is that a lot of people who are using these in their sites for things like leased lines, have like 10mb/20mb/30mb leased lines which these types of routers will handle fine.

Anyone who use any bigger links will generally be using the enterprise routers with gigabit Ethernet ports, faster processing, which will mean a fan will most likely be used ala the 2800 series - I configured a 2800 series the other day, beast of a router for a quad bonded ADSL connection set-up.

Unfortunately when you are talking Cisco, things dont come cheap especially if you want the latest lines with the latest features.

I have 3 x Cisco 1721's at home with K9 firmware for learning, using the built in F/E port and an added F/E WIC card to give me 2 x F/E ports on each router - I got these from work but they cost peanuts on ebay, think I seen them going for like £20 each.

Old routers but do the job of learning nicely.

Just going to our stock room to see if I can spot anything else which may be of use to use, although I think the others we have all have fans.

EDIT: yep I was right, we have a pile of 2800 series enterprise routers, Cisco 2600 Series, Cisco 1841 which are fanless and have 2 x F/E ports, Cisco 881 which I think are fanless and has 4 x F/E ports, few Cisco 857's, Cisco 1721's which have a very small fan but very quiet.
 
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I can only see a spec guide on these through google, I cant actually see them listed any where to buy? :confused:

Cisco 897VA
 
Same here:-

I cannot understand what the differences are between these two partnumbers

C897VAW-A-K9 Cisco 897 VA Gigabit Ethernet security router with SFP and VDSL/ADSL2+ Annex A with Wireless


C897VAW-E-K9 Cisco 897VA Gigabit Ethernet security router with SFP and VDSL/ADSL2+ Annex A with Wireless






-A or -E, I have no clue what this means.
 
[bgcb]REPO_MAN;23941212 said:
Ive got Virgin Media 120MB cable.

I want to get into cisco routers and connect it to my virgin box, and use the virgin box as jsut a modem.

Now, can someone recommend a cisco wireless/wired router that can handle this sort of connection speed, has IOS and is FANLESS??

I can see the 800 series, but they only do 15Mbps for christ sakes!!!
Click to expand...

I think the 890s are quite new, I can't find them for sale in the UK, USA websites have them listed for between $700-800

If I were you I'd go for a second hand 1921 off ebay.. it's probably going to come in cheaper than a new 890 - I wouldn't worry about the fan, it's tiny and barely makes any noise.
 
[bgcb]REPO_MAN;23941867 said:
-A or -E, I have no clue what this means.
Click to expand...

I don't often deal with the 800s so I'm not sure, but I think the A or E signifies the software feature set, where 'E' might mean Enhanced, so it'll come with extra IOS security features, 'A' might mean advanced, in which it'll come with an advanced IP feature set.
 
Although not mentioned on this model the A or E refers to the wireless specification , Cisco do list it on other models

CISCO892FW-A-K9
Cisco 892 Gigabit security router with SFP and 802.11n, FCC compliant

CISCO892FW-E-K9
Cisco 892 Gigabit security router with SFP and 802.11n, ETSI compliant

So E model required for Europe.

As to feature sets with IOS 15 there is a universal image with different features unlocked by licenses. the 890 default is the Advanced IP Services Image feature - which does most things unless you want some of the Unified Communications Features.

If anyone finds a UK seller I'm keen to look at this model as well
 
DJMK4 said:
I configured a Cisco 1841 yesterday, this is a fanless unit but only has 2 x built in F/E ports, and 2 WIC slots for expansion.
Click to expand...
1841s have small fans. I removed the cover of roughly 70 of them earlier in the week to take the memory before we put them to ewaste.

I have a 892-W in my room with the 3 external antennas, it has a fan unfortunately and quite annoying during the night. The 881 on the other hand is fanless.

I have the 892 connected to my virgin router using the 1GB wan port. This is because its use is a hardware VPN. So wirelessly I get the corporate network and over a few wired ports (8 In total) and a couple are personal ports so are isolated from corp network.
 
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The 1941 isn't fanless, but on the desk in normal operation you dont notice it. The 800 series have been arround a while, if you want Gb portsd on an 800 you need the 89x series, the fnaless models are below but even with the fan they are dead quiet.

• Cisco 892FSP
• Cisco 896VA
• Cisco 897VA
• Cisco 898EA

Alternativley if you dont mind losing the 20Mb/s from the top, you could go with an 88x or 87x which you should be able to pick up off e-bay.
 
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