Cisco 1921 Integrated Services Router

[Senbonzakura]

Is buying the Cisco 1921 Integrated Service Router still worth getting for studying purposes when it comes to the CCNA and CCNP?

Also, same question but for the Cisco ASA5510-SEC-BUN-K9 ASA 5510 Security Plus Appliance

Would be appreciated.

[balaji.bandi]

Not sure, if you are keen to work on physical hardware. if not consider below options :

Most of the Lab and SIM/EMULATOR available you can achieve with the software version of code.

Example :

VIRL ( Cisco) - around 100-200$

EVE-NG - Free GUI, images available all over for learning purposes.

GNS3

packet tracer ( never used, but famous around).

[Senbonzakura]

Thank you for the advice. I do enjoy GNS3 and Packet tracer, I am going to be considering VIRL for when I decide to go for my CCIE in the future but I do enjoy the physical equipment since I do lack the experience with hands on in the IT industry.

[balaji.bandi]

Agreed Physical hands-on very important, but the hardware you lobbying and the hardware in the real world totally different.

Most of the vendor documents give you how the hardware looks and how the ports to be connected, Physically. 

This was very important to choose the right career path to learn (not about the money) - some Cisco Gold partners give an opportunity for you to work, so that was you need to grab the opportunity to jump on.

as mentioned one of mate hee, instead of investing in vendor hardware for training, invest on server/workstation which can save a lot of money and learn other vendor tools in the competition.

Again this discussion has 2 sides of the coin ( end call is yours).

I myself invested good server 4 years back...the kind of exposure you get learning things have paid back easily for my point of view.

Good luck.

[Senbonzakura]

Thank you everyone for your advice and outlook, if I could mark all of your replies as solutions I would! Thank you again, it's greatly appreciated.

[balaji.bandi]

if that discussion makes sense and you have the answer what you looking, then good to close as a solution.

any further inputs happy to help and address here.

[Georg Pauwen]

Hello,

it is obviously a matter of personal opinion and preference, but I would agree with you that having access to physical devices is very useful. You can get a 1921 on Ebay for less than 100 dollars. Although it is a small router, in essence, all routers are similar, so having one will probably teach you a lot...

[paul driver]

Hello

Nowadays it isn't practical to continuously purchase hardware for labbing - its too damm expensive and usually you cannot run the most relevant software - i have over the years just done that and it does give hands on however how times do you actually work on the hardware -Also you would be very lucky to administer a site with all cisco so virtual labs are the future -I have just gone virtual purchasing an high tech pc with copious amounts of memory and 12core cpu more than amp to be able to run not only cisco vms but other vendors also

I have a mixture of eve-ng gns3 and soon to be viral only last week i was able to simulate a project involving nexus and juniper something you wouldn't able to do unless you had the hardware

So personally save you pennies and look towards upgrading your virtual lab