A Cisco Router Lab is a hands-on practice environment for learning, configuring, and troubleshooting Cisco networks from the foundational CCNA level all the way to the expert CCIE level.
This hands-on lab configures OSPFv3 between two routers to dynamically route IPv6 traffic, comparing its configuration syntax against the OSPFv2 labs covered earlier in this series while highlighting the interface-level activation approach OSPFv3 uses.
This hands-on lab configures EIGRP for IPv6 between two routers, activating the protocol directly on each interface similar to OSPFv3's approach, and highlights the mandatory router ID requirement unique to EIGRPv6.
This hands-on lab configures multi-area OSPF across three routers, designating an ABR that summarizes several subnets from a leaf area into a single route advertised toward the backbone, tying together the area design and summarization concepts covered earlier in this series.
This hands-on lab configures a leaf area as a standard stub area, then upgrades it to a totally stubby area, comparing the routing table size at each stage and verifying only a default route remains once fully configured.
This hands-on lab configures Area 1 as an NSSA, redistributing a local external route directly from within that area and verifying it propagates as a Type 7 LSA before being translated to Type 5 at the ABR, while inter-area routes from elsewhere remain blocked exactly as in a standard stub area.
This hands-on lab connects a disconnected area to the backbone using an OSPF virtual link, addressing a design violation where an area does not have a direct physical connection to Area 0, and verifies routes flow correctly once the virtual link is established.
This hands-on lab configures MD5 authentication on an OSPF link between two routers, verifying the neighbor relationship requires a matching key on both sides and observing the resulting failure when the keys are mismatched.
This hands-on lab configures MD5 authentication on an EIGRP-enabled interface using a key chain, verifying the neighbor relationship requires a matching key on both sides and observing the resulting failure when keys are mismatched.
This hands-on lab configures a class-map and policy-map to classify voice traffic, marks it with DSCP EF, applies a priority queue guaranteeing bandwidth for it, and verifies both the marking and queuing behavior take effect on the outbound interface.
This hands-on lab configures a complete site-to-site IPsec VPN between two routers, walking through ISAKMP Phase 1 policy, an IPsec transform set, a crypto map, and verification of both security association phases.
This hands-on lab combines a GRE tunnel with IPsec encryption, allowing a dynamic routing protocol to run across an encrypted link between two sites, something a plain IPsec VPN alone cannot support directly.
This hands-on lab configures a basic single-hub DMVPN topology using a multipoint GRE tunnel and NHRP, demonstrating how a spoke dynamically registers its physical address with the hub without requiring a separate point-to-point tunnel per spoke.
