Best VPN for 1721

[jwynacht]

Hi,

I have a Cisco 1721 with the ADSL card and 4-port WIC and would like to also have VPN access to that box to manage a server on the LAN behind it.

Can anyone suggest the best way/products to go about doing that for this box? Do I have to swap out the WIC for the VPN functionality?

Thanks,

Jon

[Richard Burts]

Jon

I am not sure why you would need to swap out the WIC to get VPN functionality. You have not explained much about your topology and current connectivity (what is accessed through the ADSL and what is accessed through the WIC) and that might have some impact on how to implement.

I have implemented a pretty extensive VPN network for a customer (about 100 remote sites) and most of our remote routers are 1721s. Our 1721s have the VPN accelerator which optimizes operation of the VPN. I am not clear whether your router has the accelerator or not. Not having the accelerator would not prevent you from running VPN on your 1721.

The most important thing for you to be able to run VPN is to make sure that the IOS on your 1721 supports VPN (typically it requires the Security feature set or something that supports DES/3DES encryption). If you have the correct IOS support and have proper IP connectivity then you should be able to run VPN on the 1721.

HTH

Rick

[jwynacht]

Rick,

Thanks for getting back to me and apologies for being vague. I have a DSL line going into the 1721 from SBC. On the WIC side I have a server and three client computers. I'd like to be able to securely access the server from outside the network and wanted to do this via VPN.

I thought this might take a hardware card, hence my idea of swapping cards out. Looks like it's all about software so I'll have to go log into the box and poke around a bit.

Any pointers to get me going with VPN and the 1721? I don't have the accelerator as far as I know. If my IOS doesn't have the Security feature set that supports DES/3DES then I suppose that's the first place to start?

Thanks,

Jon