I’ve been working with more Cisco products lately than anything else. We’re upgrading the phone system from a legacy PBX setup to a Cisco VoIP system. Actually, we’re extending the existing system which is already up and running in some sites. We’re slowly replacing everything with Cisco. As part of the project, we replaced a large number of network devices with new Cisco switches. Other than the time involved, the whole process was pretty easy. It started getting strange(and continues to be) when we had to start dealing with the gateways.

Cisco’s routers are very powerful, but very specific. You have to make sure you know what you need and whether it will work in the router. Then you have to make sure that all the cards you need will fit in the slots. For instance, a Cisco 1760 multi service router will only take voice interface cards in slots 2 and 3; but slots 0 and 1 WILL take a VWIC pri card. Then you have to make sure you have the right version of IOS on the router that actually has the features you need.

What is comes down to is your really have to pay attention to the compatibility matrices. If you have a ton of extra gear just sitting around, then you will probably have less of an issue. But for those who don’t, I guess that’s why Cisco is so financially successful!