Router to Connect VLANs

Technically, a router on a stick will function in the exact same way. The issue to be cognizant of is bandwidth. When you use a router on a stick, you will have a single 100 meg or gig interface for any traffic going in/out of both vlans. When you have a router with two interfaces, they can operate indepedently, particularly if you have a large WAN or a significant portion of the network sitting somewhere else. For small offices, or small networks, routers on a stick are perfect. For any significant sized networks, they can not be a good idea since a single communication flow can hammer the backbone (all trunked vlans). This is also only for inter-vlan communications....intra vlan is a different story depending on your architecture.

"Bob Simon" ha scritto nel messaggio news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

Hi,

You could pratically make use of almost cisco every router with a FastEthernet.

From a performance standpoint if you do not require "top of the class" performance you could use a "router on a stick" without troubles. (for example a cisco 26x1[XM] has two FastEthernet ports and it's pretty cheap but it can't forward/switch at a full 200Mbps line rate). You could also buy a L3 Switch (more performing and with more "LAN" features that a "simple" router).

Regards, Gabriele

I think I tried it on a 1720 and it didn't work. Apparently the 1720 doesn't support dot1q. I was told a 1721 would, though.

1721 does

Gabrielle, Thanks for the pointer to the 2611XM. I see that it forwards 20 kpps. Even with minimum size packets, this is over 10Mbps -- plenty fast for my environment. Others have made a convincing argument that having two ethernet interfaces is an advantage and since I see these on eBay for around $150 - $200 (which as you say is "pretty cheap") this seems well suited to my needs.

This router went EOS March 27 2007. What does this mean in terms of service and support?

Is it a bad idea to buy an EOS router if I want to keep it in service for five years?

If I buy one used, will I have a problem purchasing a SmartNet service contract for it?

That in 4 years or so, Cisco won't don't anything for it. No more bug fixes, no new software releases. They might do something for a major security alert, but probably not.

With the understanding that you probably won't be able to run the latest code or features on it. And after the EOE phase, there'll be no bug fixes what-so-ever.

No, not for this size, but since it's EOS, eventually you will have problems buying SmartNet once it reaches EOE.

"Bob Simon" ha scritto nel messaggio news: snipped-for-privacy@4ax.com...

Hi,

I don't know if End-Of-Sale also means End of Support, but consider that the 2600XM platform is a bit old (but it can support (depending on ROM) up to 256MB of RAM and 48MB of flash (it can support recent 12.4T IOS and in a note I sought that Cisco will probably add support for 12.5 IOS). You have an additional Network Module slot if you need voice for example)... a Cisco

2621 (should have 25Kpps) is even cheaper but it support up to IOS 12.3.

Other good platforms are the 37xx ones and obviously the more recent

28xx and 38xx... but there are not "cheap" and probably more than you really need.

Regards, Gabriele

~ >Is it a bad idea to buy an EOS router if I want to keep it in service ~ >for five years? ~ ~ With the understanding that you probably won't be able to run the ~ latest code or features on it. And after the EOE phase, there'll be no ~ bug fixes what-so-ever. ~ ~ >If I buy one used, will I have a problem purchasing a SmartNet service ~ >contract for it? ~ ~ No, not for this size, but since it's EOS, eventually you will have ~ problems buying SmartNet once it reaches EOE.

Here are the dates for 2611XM:

End of Software Maintenance Releases Date ("EoE"): 27-MAR-2010 End of New Service Attachment Date: 26-MAR-2008 End of Service Contract Renewal Date: 25-JUN-2011 Last Date of Support: 25-MAR-2012

Reference:

So you will be able to get Smartnet for this for quite a while (as long as you sign up by March).

You will be limited as to new features - I would not anticipate that a 2611XM will get many more features than what it has right now (as of 12.4(15)T.)

Regards,

Aaron

Using two ethernet interfaces will segment your network onto 2 LANs, therefore no need for VLANs. The benefit of VLANs is to use one Router interface and create several sub interfaces to segment your network onto Virtual Local Area Networks

my 2cts peace t0