# Cisco 1720



## CentralViking19 (Feb 25, 2008)

I have a question about a Cisco 1700 Series router i bought from a company that was going out of business. Its a Cisco 1720 valued at like 1700 bucks i think and i bought it bundled with tons of other stuff for $75.

Anyway, can i use this router with my comcast cable modem? I am know how to get it set up but just for static IP's addresses, not DHCP wans.

Thanks for the help!


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## Geoff (Feb 25, 2008)

You could but theres really no point, what do you plan to do with it that you can't do with a consumer router?

Is this what yours looks like? 






If so, you would need to purchase an add-on card in order to actually connect multiple devices to it.


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## Homenet (Feb 25, 2008)

Hi, yes you can! You would connect your cable modem to the WIC port on the CISCO, the only thing your probably gonna need a small switch as the cisco only has 1 LAN port on it so if your planning on using more than 1 wired device your going to need a switch.

EDIT: actually if yours doesnt come with the WIC card then you will need an additional card in there.


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## CentralViking19 (Feb 25, 2008)

well it has a WIC in it, it isnt the serial connection like the picture above, the WIC is a ethernet port but it says 56/64kb DSU/CSU, if you want i can take a picture of the WIC

EDIT: i found the WIC that is in my router, it looks exactly the same as this one, i removed it from the router to verify this
http://www.chrosmack.com/items/item.aspx?itemid=2638238


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## Geoff (Feb 26, 2008)

That appears to only be able to transfer data up to 56Kbps, although I'm not entirely sure there.  The router does look to be fairly old.


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## CentralViking19 (Feb 27, 2008)

i dont really want a 56kbps limit on my 4mb internet

anybody have ideas of a WIC i can use?


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## Homenet (Feb 27, 2008)

You need a CISCO 10/100 WAN WIC card, prolly get one cheap off ebay otherwise its gonna cost you a fair bit  im not entirely sure why your going to the trouble of using a cisco router though.


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## Geoff (Feb 27, 2008)

While it's not practical for your purpose, it's great to be able to play around with the equipment.


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## tlarkin (Feb 27, 2008)

Consumer based router + DD-WRT firmware is very similar to what Cisco routers do.  DD-WRT is based on the same Linux kernel that is in the cisco firmware, except of course its open source.

I would check that out instead

www.dd-wrt.com


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## Geoff (Feb 27, 2008)

tlarkin said:


> Consumer based router + DD-WRT firmware is very similar to what Cisco routers do.  DD-WRT is based on the same Linux kernel that is in the cisco firmware, except of course its open source.
> 
> I would check that out instead
> 
> www.dd-wrt.com


I've looked into that for my WRT54G, but I could never get it to work properly (yes I checked for the correct router version), but it does offer many features which were once not available using the pre-loaded Linksys or other firmware.


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## tlarkin (Feb 27, 2008)

Yeah, it seems that the Buffalo ones have better luck with it.  I went out and purchased a WRT54GL, which is specifically made to run third party firmware.  If you can still find a WRT54GL I recommend you pick one up.  They also have 16megs of RAM standard which is more than most basic consumer level routers.


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## CentralViking19 (Feb 27, 2008)

ahhh!!! nevermind, ill get help from someone who isnt all work and professional.....i just want to have a cisco router for fun and i also enjoy setting things like this up.....nvm then


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## tlarkin (Feb 27, 2008)

CentralViking19 said:


> ahhh!!! nevermind, ill get help from someone who isnt all work and professional.....i just want to have a cisco router for fun and i also enjoy setting things like this up.....nvm then



You never fully explained yourself, and what we are saying is that managing a very small network with only 25 clients is kind of over kill, not to mention you talk about a budget.  You are best off either creating a software based firewall/gateway thorugh something like softwall and a cheap PC or getting a higher end consumer router.

Those cheap cisco routers are cheap because they are ancient.


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## Geoff (Feb 28, 2008)

CentralViking19 said:


> ahhh!!! nevermind, ill get help from someone who isnt all work and professional.....i just want to have a cisco router for fun and i also enjoy setting things like this up.....nvm then


If you want one for your home to mess around with and get to know the Cisco IOS, then sure go ahead, but it's not worth the several hundred you would pay for a used one if thats all you want it for.  Have you looked into getting Packet Tracer?  It has almost all the same commands and configuration that the real equipment has.


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## CentralViking19 (Feb 28, 2008)

well im going to buy a used 2620, i have packet tracer already, i got it through the cisco student site, its a really neat program


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## Camper (Feb 29, 2008)

CentralViking19 said:


> well im going to buy a used 2620, i have packet tracer already, i got it through the cisco student site, its a really neat program



Are you Talking about Netacad


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## CentralViking19 (Feb 29, 2008)

yes, thanks i was drawing a blank when posting that


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## Camper (Feb 29, 2008)

I did not know they sold routers


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## Geoff (Feb 29, 2008)

Camper said:


> I did not know they sold routers


You never knew that Cisco sold routers...


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## Camper (Mar 1, 2008)

I did not know they sold routers to students on Netacad.


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## CentralViking19 (Mar 2, 2008)

cisco net acad doesnt sell routers, you probably got confused when i changed topics from buying a cisco router to using packet tracer, probably should have used a period over a comma


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