Hi Jim, Speaking from personal experience, I find what Steve says is pretty much on the money about USB NIC reliability.
When I was first playing around with my home lab using simulated routers and real switches I bought a bundle of Linksys USB200M USB NICs - these are supported in Windows and Ubuntu so are pretty good, however I started to experience problems with large numbers of these things and as you can see you need a good quantity for the IPExpert topology - I have no idea if it was due to the cheapo USB hubs I was using, the motherboard or what but it was frustrating and something I gave up on. In my particular case I ended up with an extra 3550 as a breakout switch - it's not perfect because unlike a 3750 you cannot do L2PT on trunk interfaces so things like STP transport if you're playing with IRB or complete CDP will not work (the best you can get is the routers seeing the switch ports but not the reverse) If you understand the tradeoffs it may be ok for you. If you're considering a breakout switch, the config I have for my 3550 is here - http://noshut.blogspot.com/2010/08/modifications-to-my-underlying-lab.html In the end, I kept hold of some of the USB NICs because in small quantities they are pretty solid, so I when I did want to experiment with things like IRB, I used them. Cheers, Adam On Wed, Jun 15, 2011 at 3:04 PM, Di Bias, Steve <[email protected]>wrote: > Jim, > > Yes, if you want to do the IPX labs you need these interfaces. For R2 you > may be able to get away with only two interfaces but you need at least two > per router. Tyson wrote another article where he used 5 4xFE cards in a 6U > server > > > http://blog.ipexpert.com/2011/02/28/gns3-and-physical-switches-breakout-switch/ > > Since you are running this off a laptop, this obviously isn't going to work > for you. When I was considering using GNS3 with real switches I searched > eBAY for used servers with PCI-E/X slots so I could purchase these quad > NIC's, USB just doesn't sound very reliable for networking but it will > probably work. > > > Thank you, > > Steve E. Di Bias > Network Engineer - Information Systems > Valley Health System - Las Vegas > Office - 702- 369-7594 > Cell - 702-241-1801 > [email protected] > > -----Original Message----- > From: Jim Feo [mailto:[email protected]] > Sent: Tuesday, June 14, 2011 7:43 PM > To: Di Bias, Steve; [email protected]; [email protected] > Subject: RE: [OSL | CCIE_RS] lab with gns3 > > > > anybody have experience connecting 20 usb nic to a laptop with success > Also do I really need that many nics for the R&S labs > > thanks > ________________________________________ > From: [email protected] [ > [email protected]] on behalf of Di Bias, Steve [ > [email protected]] > Sent: Tuesday, June 14, 2011 4:12 PM > To: [email protected]; [email protected] > Subject: Re: [OSL | CCIE_RS] lab with gns3 > > I don't have a lot of experience with these setups; however Matt does and > used GNS3 for his preparation, so he may be able to help you more. > > If you are using real switches then you should only need one NIC per router > interface (Ethernet that is). > > R1 = 2 > R2 = 2 > R4 = 2 > R5 = 2 > R6 = 2 > R7 = 2 > R8 = 2 > R9 = 2 > B1 = 1 > B2 = 1 > B3 = 1 > ------- > = 19 > > The best way to do this would be to purchase a bunch of multiport NIC's > along with some USB NIC's too. > > Don't forget to follow Tyson's blog on setting this up as well > > http://blog.ipexpert.com/2010/07/05/gns3-on-ubuntu-910-the-ipexpert-way/ > > HTH > > > Thank you, > > Steve Di Bias > Network Engineer - Information Systems > Valley Health System - Las Vegas > Office - 702- 369-7594 > Cell - 702-241-1801 > [email protected] > > -----Original Message----- > From: [email protected] [mailto: > [email protected]] On Behalf Of [email protected] > Sent: Tuesday, June 14, 2011 11:06 AM > To: [email protected] > Subject: [OSL | CCIE_RS] lab with gns3 > > I just got the end to end R$S > > Looking to set my lab up this week. I have 2 3550 and 2 3560 with gns3 > using ubuntu Laptop > > I think I am going to use usb nic how many do I need for the lab. Monoprice > brand > > I thought I was going to use a breakout switch however I don't have 3750 > and I here there are some bugs with that setup" > > Let me know your experience and suggestions > > thanks > _______________________________________________ > For more information regarding industry leading CCIE Lab training, please > visit www.ipexpert.com > > Are you a CCNP or CCIE and looking for a job? Check out > www.PlatinumPlacement.com > > > UHS Confidentiality Notice: This e-mail message, including any > attachments, is for the sole use of the intended recipient (s) and may > contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, > use, disclosure or distribution of this information is prohibited. If this > was sent to you in error, please notify the sender by reply e-mail and > destroy all copies of the original message. > _______________________________________________ > For more information regarding industry leading CCIE Lab training, please > visit www.ipexpert.com > > Are you a CCNP or CCIE and looking for a job? Check out > www.PlatinumPlacement.com > > > UHS Confidentiality Notice: This e-mail message, including any > attachments, is for the sole use of the intended recipient (s) and may > contain confidential and privileged information. Any unauthorized review, > use, disclosure or distribution of this information is prohibited. If this > was sent to you in error, please notify the sender by reply e-mail and > destroy all copies of the original message. > _______________________________________________ > For more information regarding industry leading CCIE Lab training, please > visit www.ipexpert.com > > Are you a CCNP or CCIE and looking for a job? Check out > www.PlatinumPlacement.com > _______________________________________________ For more information regarding industry leading CCIE Lab training, please visit www.ipexpert.com Are you a CCNP or CCIE and looking for a job? Check out www.PlatinumPlacement.com
