HP and Cisco – VLANs and Trunks Confusion!
KB ID 0000741 Problem When I first started in IT, I went and did my Cisco CCNA. So I learned that to connect Cisco switches and pass VLAN traffic between them, I needed to create a ‘Trunk’ to pass the VLAN traffic. Fast forward a few years, and I now work for an HP reseller. Very early on I came to realise that what HP called a ‘trunk’ was very different from what I had been taught. Below is an article I did a...
Cisco Catalyst Password Recovery / Reset
KB ID 0000496 Problem The title is a bit of a misnomer, we are not going to recover the password, we are simply going to change the password to one we know. Solution Note: This procedure works on models, 2900, 2940, 2950, 2955, 3500XL, and 3550. Before you start connect the the device with a console cable and terminal emulation software, the procedure is the same as the one I’ve outlined here. 1. Power the switch off >press...
Cisco Catalyst Switches – Set a Management IP and Allow Telnet and Web Management
KB ID 0000614 Problem If you want to manage your Cisco Catalyst switch it’s not always practical to plug a console cable in to change its settings or monitor what it is doing. Putting an IP address on it and enabling remote management via Telnet or from your web browser is a better alternative, particularly if you have a lot of switches. Solution Enable Telnet Management on Cisco Catalyst Switch 1. Connect to the Switch using a...
Cisco IOS – Configuring Switch to Switch MACSEC
KB ID 0001000 Problem My colleague had to set this up on the test bench today, and it looked infinitely more interesting that what I was doing, so I grabbed my console cable, and offered to ‘help’. This was done on two Cisco Catalyst 3560-X switches, each with a 10G Service Module (C3KX-SM-10G), and 1Gb SFP modules (Note: Not 10Gb ones, this will become important later). Solution 1. First hurdle was, when we tried to add...
Cisco Catalyst – Upgrading ‘Stacked’ Switches
KB ID 0001002 Problem The following procedure was carried out on two Cisco Catalyst 3750 switches. Solution 1. We can see (above) that we have two switches, but if your connected remotely, best make sure. Petes-Stack#show switch Switch/Stack Mac Address : 0018.7347.a000 H/W Current Switch# Role Mac Address Priority Version State...
Configuring Multiple Cisco Switch Ports at the Same Time
KB ID 0001009 Problem If you have the same configuration that needs to be placed on multiple ports, then doing each one individually can be time consuming. To save time use the ‘interface range’ command. Be aware this command is only available on devices running IOS versions newer than 12.0(7)XE, Release 12.1 E, and Release 12.1(5)T. Solution 1. From configure terminal mode, I want to apply the same configuration to...
Cisco Catalyst – ‘Daughtercard inserted in this switch may not have been manufactured by Cisco’
KB ID 0001018 Problem In a newly deployed switch, the MACSEC link refused to establish, when I consoled in I was greeted with this; Dec 06 01:30:07.023: %ILET-1-DEVICE_AUTHENTICATION_FAIL: The FRULink SM Daughtercard inserted in this switch may not have been manufactured by Cisco or with Cisco’s authorization. If your use of this product is the cause of a support issue, Cisco may deny operation of the product, support under...
Cisco Catalyst – Find out What Port an IP Address is Plugged Into
KB ID 0001022 Problem I networked some gear this afternoon, and I made a mental note of the ports I patched into on the switch. On the way back to the office I got side-tracked. By the time I got back to my desk I could not remember what port I had used, and I wanted to add a description to the port. This is not my server room 🙂 So I knew the IP address but not the port number, how can you find that out? Solution 1. My IP address is...
Cisco Catalyst – Upgrading IOS (via USB)
KB ID 0001056 Problem Had a stack of 3560-X Switches to update today, and when I went looking for the notes I used last time, I could not find them. So This time I took the time to document the procedure. Solution Now I could load in the IOS image from TFTP like this, but last time I did this I used a spare USB drive and the image ‘tar’ file, and found it a lot less hassle. 1. Make sure you have formatted your dive at...
Cisco Catalyst – Configure Ports for VMware ESXi NICs using VLANS
KB ID 0001065 Problem If you don’t need different virtual machines to be in different VLANS on your vSphere/ESXi servers then you probably just connect everything together and it all works fine. I was trying to carve off some hosts into their own VLAN today, and setup a new vSwitch. or if you prefer to work in the fat client. Now you can see (above), I’ve presented one physical NIC to this vSwitch (vmnic1). This is...