First, I am not Cisco certified, and have learn all I know the hard way, but get around pretty well in the IOS. I have a simple network at home but it has to many devices and too much traffic for the normal home DSL devices, and I finally gave up rebooting them every few hours and bought a serious device. I have been working through getting it configured, but as I understand it, I need to get a support contract in order to have the right to download IOS updates? Also, in order to get the ability to turn on the use of firewall? So I am now trying to find out, with no success so far since no one wants to talk to a NON HUGE CORP about a support contract, how to get one and what will it cost, and will the firewall cost even more? Can someone point me to some answers?
Oh, and after getting SDM down and set up (with some serious hurtle like Java 1.6), it tells me the device isn't supported, which I was sure I read it in the list in the SDM manual.
