For those of you who have many servers in a facility.

Do you recommend having your own router, or use the router of the facility? What are the pros and cons?

Also, what model do you recommend for CISCO Catalyst's switch?

Well it depends on how much traffic you are doing. Your needs. How many ips and what you want to do with them.

And a cisco 2924XL-EN is nice.

jayglate,

Do you recommend, as a start off, use the facility's router?

I was looking at CISCO 2900 series on eBay.
Are you using the same model, cisco 2924XL-EN?

For a switch the 2924XL-EN is great.

And yes use the facilities router unless you have alot of ip or need to do freaky stuff with them.

:wavey:

Thanks, jayglate!

Do you recommend having your own router, or use the router of the facility? What are the pros and cons?
I think the biggest "con" is the investment required for a decent router. There are some lower-priced ones out there, but I wouldn't recommend buying them. An internetwork is NOT something you want to sit up at night worrying about.

If you DO get one, I would definitely recommend one of Cisco's or 3 Com's layer3 switches/routers. They're reliable, easy to manage and leave a small footprint.
If you don't have a great deal of networking knowledge, I would also recommend buying a study-at-home CCNA course. It will be money well spent.

sbrad,

Thanks for your input.


I was thinking "Should I use the facility'router?" or "Should I purchase one?" Since the facility's router is several thousand dollars and I couldn't think of any reason to get a router of my own, I decided to go with the facility's router.

One thing that I need to purchase is a switch. I will probably going to get cisco 2924XL-EN, since jayglate recommended it.

Right now, I am taking classes on the weekend on Internetwork and Networking.
I will probably going to purchase CCNA 2.0 from Keystone Learning.

That's a great choice. You can't go wrong.
I don't know how much the one from Keystone is, but I got the CCNA Certification Kit from Sybex, and I think it's supurb. I think it goes for around $115 at Amazon, and it comes with a great book and a router simulator. It also has lots of freebie utilities, a dictionary and practice exams.

<offtopic>
sbrad, would you reccomend purchasing some of these texts from Sybex (specifically the ones for the MCSE and A+ exams) or taking a $1900 class from the local computer training facility?
</offtopic>

sbrad, would you reccomend purchasing some of these texts from Sybex (specifically the ones for the MCSE and A+ exams) or taking a $1900 class from the local computer training facility?
I suppose it all depends on your ability to work things out on your own, and the dicipline you have to make yourself do it.
The first time I ever took a course like that was for my real estate license several years ago. It's alot harder than you think being the instructor AND the student. But at the same time, it was very rewarding for me because I learned more than I could have in a structured class where what you are going to learn is determined up front.
So, being no expert, I would say it totally depends on YOU. :)

Good advice. My mother is actually taking a real estate certification class right now ;)

Pricewise, I may have no choice. Who sells the best A+ and MCSE books?

Originally posted by mikeknoxv
Good advice. My mother is actually taking a real estate certification class right now ;)

Pricewise, I may have no choice. Who sells the best A+ and MCSE books?

If you want to watch instead of reading, try keystonelearning.com (http://www.keystonelearning.com)

Originally posted by Asia


If you want to watch instead of reading, try keystonelearning.com (http://www.keystonelearning.com)

Thank you for the tip.
Although, the price factor comes to play once again.