Cisco IOS Emulator

Anyone know of a good Cisco IOS emulator which will emulate a Cisco Switch.

I'm not after building a full virtual network, I'm just after some kind of emulator I can run to get a hang of the commands and configuring Cisco switches over CLI OS.

Any suggestions?

well if you have the gear like the routers and switches you can use Hyperterminal. Thats what I used in school and if you want to emulate like buiding a network if you do not have the gear you can use Packet Tracer. but other than that, that is all I know.

Get Cisco's Packet Tracer program as mentioned above. I use it for university all the time. Has everything you'll ever need.

I used packet tracer too. But most people would prefer to use real hardware and a terminal emulator software like PuTTY, Hyperterminal, and so on.

well they do sell kits for them on ebay. I would recomend them if you want to get in depth with them.

http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid=p2050601.m570.l1313.TR2.TRC1&_nkw=cisco+kit&_sacat=0&_from=R40

 

but its all up to the person. but hands on is what I think is the best.

Might be a little late on the train, but this looks promising: http://www.gns3.net/

Trouble is that if only there were a reliable source of funds, it would be a worthy grab.

GNS3 is brilliant if you're still learning basic routing, but as far as I'm aware, it doesn't support switching fully. Packet Tracer, as mentioned before, is a great learning tool, but is definitely not a replacement for the hardware, especially if you plan to go past CCNA.

PT is ok but it has more then a few problems like some commards you can do on the real hardware dont work in pt e.g some of the vtp and spanning-tree are one in the end you want to do it on real hard ware.

so if you do buy some for a switch a 2960 is nice so is a 3560 and a good router is a 2811 these are what you most likey use if you do CCAN 1-4 but it might change depending on were you are also they are chageing the coruse this year by adding in ipv6 OSP mulity area and a few other things

i might be wron on some of this thow

GNS3 is realy good  for routers if you can get the IOS for it and you can like it in to a live network too if you know what you are doing

any way thats my 2cents