How to find the best GNS3 version to satisfy any network topology requirement
Within the last decade of my network career, the best network lab simulation which I found to do cost-effective lab practical is GNS3 software. Even though there were many versions released, it is a little difficult to identify the best version which will suitable to satisfy your requirement. This magical awesome simulation software can run on your workstation and it allows creating simple to very complex network topologies to practice configuration commands and then jump into the issues related to network topology for further troubleshooting.
GNS3 this magical monster can provide you whatever the topology you desire to build for your lab. GNS3 also directly helps you to pass the Lab questions in your Cisco certification exams and GNS3 gives you the real-time networking lab experience as well. However, you need to acquire deeper understand about GNS3 simulation software and it’s version vice difference to build the required topology or the device which you desire to configure. For example, traditional GNS3 (old versions) allows running ASA firewall and routers. So, then what about L2/L3 switches and other well-known firewalls such as PaloAlto. Today I am going to discuss which the best GNS3 version can satisfy your design requirement.
I have installed GNS3, 2.1.3 version and tested PaloAlto firewall. As usual, it has taken several minutes to load the initial configuration setup and then able to access the firewall through its web console without any errors. Both L2 and L3 switches run very smoothly on the same version. But when adding ASA firewall, the 2.1.3 version is not supported for the traditional ASA. So, if you are willing to add ASA to GNS3, you have to download ASAv firmware. According to my experience, ASAv gets a lot of times to load the configuration and meanwhile, it stuck when booting up the firewall. Therefore I would like to share a summary description of the GNS3 versions to select a good GNS3 version for your lab. I have tested those versions in my laptop and got the experience, then identified the bugs when running GNS3 under different kind of versions. After Googling and internet surfing, I have installed several versions. In some cases, some versions can run both Palo Alto and ASA firewall, but couldn’t able to run L2 switches. If L2 switch were worked fine, the firewall would be stuck or couldn’t able to boot up.
My off-peak internet quota exceeded and internet surfing was very slow. However, I have kept my effort to find the best version to run to satisfy my requirement. So, I had to wait until midnight because I had off-peak internet quota. After the third consecutive nightmare, I found the best in GNS3 version. The L2 switch boot-up the process consumed like around 3 minutes, but after getting into its enable mode, the switch worked smoothly. As a summary note, GNS3 version 1.2.3 is working in my laptop without any errors. I would like to share ASA and Palo Alto firewall installment and L2 switch setup in GNS3 through my future posts. So, be a follower of my blog to subscribe and get the latest article once I post. If you have any doubts regarding the GNS3 version installation, please don’t hesitate to comment below.
My off-peak internet quota exceeded and internet surfing was very slow. However, I have kept my effort to find the best version to run to satisfy my requirement. So, I had to wait until midnight because I had off-peak internet quota. After the third consecutive nightmare, I found the best in GNS3 version. The L2 switch boot-up the process consumed like around 3 minutes, but after getting into its enable mode, the switch worked smoothly. As a summary note, GNS3 version 1.2.3 is working in my laptop without any errors. I would like to share ASA and Palo Alto firewall installment and L2 switch setup in GNS3 through my future posts. So, be a follower of my blog to subscribe and get the latest article once I post. If you have any doubts regarding the GNS3 version installation, please don’t hesitate to comment below.
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