console connections

Mar 11, 2009 8 Replies

Hi guys,



I am looking for something that would allow me to control 8-10 network devices via the console connection. I heave researched the topic and so far found these two options:


1.) Router with a serial port and the "octopus cable"

If you go with a cisco, the HWIC-8A is supported on the 1841, and HWIC-16A is supported on the 2801. The NM-16A is supported on the 2600 series and the 2811.

the

Hi,

I use the following and it has been working a treat for a long time,

cisco 2511 (68030) processor (revision M) with 14336K/2048K bytes of memory.

1 Ethernet/IEEE 802.3 interface(s) 2 Serial network interface(s) 16 terminal line(s) 32K bytes of non-volatile configuration memory. 8192K bytes of processor board System flash (Read ONLY)

It is a real easy set up and config, you will also require 2 octal cables for the 16 console connection.

if you need the config or anything else i can help you with then just drop a reply

Cheers

Andrew

Thanks Andrew. In the end I think I will be looking into something like console switch. It looks that they are cheaper than a router + octo cable solution.

Regards, AL

Thanks Andrew. In the end I think I will be looking into something like console switch. It looks that they are cheaper than a router + octo cable solution.

Regards, AL

Thanks Andrew. In the end I think I will be looking into something like console switch. It looks that they are cheaper than a router + octo cable solution.

Regards, AL

Another option is to pick up some cheap USB to serial adapters (less than $10 each on e-bay when I bought five) and an obsolete USB1.1 hub, and put to work that old notebook computer which is too wimpy to even run XP. If its new enough to have a USB port, you can load Linux on the box and run an independent "minicom" session for each adapter. Plus you get a bit of security and flexibility for free - ssh rather than telnet, MRTG for monitoring your production gear, wireshark to see what is really going on in the network, etc., etc., and you get multi-user remote access and file sharing by design.

Good luck and have fun!

Syslog server is always handy to have.

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