Expert's answer

The DLCI is a value assigned to each virtual circuit and DTE device connection point in the Frame Relay WAN. Two different connections can be assigned the same value within the same Frame Relay WAN—one on each side of the virtual connection. [1]

So depending on whether your end is configured as DCE or DTE you may or may not need to assign the DLCI for your local interface. It sounds like your router was playing the DTE role and so after you assigned the DLCI you had both ends of the virtual circuit set up.

This page provides a nice overview of frame relay to go with all the Cisco docs you're studying for the CCNA.

Expert's answer

According to Cisco, "If a router keeps entering the ROM monitor mode each time the router is powered up or reloaded, the first setting that should be checked is the configured value of the configuration register."

This page at www.bradreese.com describes three reasons why a router or switch may go into ROM Monitor mode at boot time and provides direct links to Cisco documentation for recovery on a variety of hardware platforms.

In a nutshell your device has lost its boot image and needs to have a new boot image loaded into the system using TFTP or possibly a flash memory card. To work with TFTP you will need a computer hosting TFTP server software that is reachable over the network from your device and you will probably need to connect a terminal to the console port as it is difficult if not impossible to load a new image via TFTP through a telnet connection.

The Cisco release notes covering the WS-C2980G-A are available here and contain information that may help you obtain a copy of the boot image you need if you do not have the software available.

Hopefully all you need to do is issue a confreg command similar to

>confreg 0x2102

in order to restore the boot mode and then restart to have it boot IOS properly.

Expert's answer

connect all the PCs to that. You can link from one of the ports on the switch into the network at the location you are at.

Actually, there's an even cheaper solution: Find some used hubs in the 16-24 port range and hook a couple of them together. However, there's a cost to this cheapness: A slow network that will leave you and your users grumpy.

With 30 computers, you probably want to think about management. I'd suggest spending a bit more and buying a manageable switch so that you can segment the computers into smaller networks - so if multiple groups are working on different projects, you can split them off into their own little worlds that shouldn't interfere with each other.

As to cost, you could theoretically get by with spending a couple of hundred dollars. If you are a non-profit operation, you might be able to ask for donations of equipment from companies that are upgrading their equipment to newer versions to help reduce the cost even more. If you have to buy new, it could run a couple of thousand for a higher-end switch that will be manageable and come with other features that might prove helpful. These costs are in addition to the wiring you will need and a patch panel if you want the wiring to look nice without having patch cables running all over the place.

Expert's answer

Depending on the flavor of VPN client software and VPN system that you connect to at work, you could actually see more than one IP address locally. I don't how easy it will be to get a static IP for your remote workstations, however.

Most of my experience for several years has been with Cisco VPN gear. In that respect, you can point the VPN unit you are terminating at (whether it be a PIX, ASA, VPN Concentrator, router, etc). You have an option at that point to either have the VPN device your connection terminates at to have it assign the IP address that your remote workstation will receive for the VPN connection or have a local DHCP server assign that address.

You won't have an address out of the same IP subnet that the workstations on the local network have because the traffic for your connection has to be routed to get to you. What this could look like is that if you are using 10.1.10.0 /24 for a subnet at the main network location, your address for the remote connection would be from 10.1.11.0/24. Essentially you would have a local address, just not on the same subnet as some of the other users. If you have to be on the same subnet because of a legacy application requirement, you might be able to set up a NAT on the VPN device so that the address would appear out of the same subnet. The problem here is that you might have to do some interesting routing configurations so that for a specific IP address so that it would point to a different path to get the traffic to where you want it to be.

I recently tried to help a reader with a Cisco setup do DHCP reservations so that they could get as close as you could try to a static address. In this case, the Cisco client generates what could be interpreted as a MAC address instead of using the hardware MAC address - it dynamically generates an address that doesn't seem to be the same every time a connection is established.

It might be possible with open-source VPN clients or other vendors' VPN offerings to get an IP address out of the same pool that is being used locally or be able to always connect with the same static IP address, but I am not aware of any. This is where having the IP address being handed out by a local DHCP server at the company end of the VPN connection can help. By having it hand out the DHCP address, it should be able to coordinate that with the local DNS server so that local users will be able to find you by your machine name instead of having to get your IP address from you in order to be able to "see" you.

Expert's answer

Much of the integration you mention is available as standard features in today's cell phones and service plans. Sending text messages to mobile phones is typically as easy as sending e-mail to . Sending e-mail from phones is built in to most phones, even my ancient brick phone can send e-mail. Newer phones contain reasonably complete web browsers so there's less need to build custom implementations for mobile phone support than there used to be although there's a large number of mobile phone specific implementations being done. Much of that is for native applications running on the phone that will talk to the network directly without using a web browser to communicate with the remote server.

Expert's answer

Robert:

From what you describe, it does sound like there is a problem between your laptop and the router. Here's what I'd try:

1) Download the latest network card drivers for your laptop. Although you work fine when plugged directly into the internet connection, it is possible that you might have a problem between the network card in the laptop and the router.

2) Go to the vendor's Web site, see if there is an updated firmware available and, if so, download it.

If you are still having problems, try doing a hard reset of the router back to factory defaults and reconfigure it. There might be something in the router that is causing your laptop to reset when connected to it. The only way we might be able to find something out that would point us in the right direction would be to have a third laptop with Cace Technologies AirPcap adapter watching the wireless traffic to see if there is some type of command/signal coming from the access point that the laptop is interpreting as a reset/reboot command.

See if you can borrow a friend's access point and duplicate the problem with that. If the problem goes away, it may be cheaper/easier to replace the access point/router than trying to figure out the problem.