Question 1

does it provides rack mounting hardware?

Accepted Answer

When we purchased some of these, they did come with the mounting hardware as well. I would imagine they still do.

Question 2

Some Cisco stuff has a max user limit, 5, 10, 15, 20, etc users.  Does this device have that?

Accepted Answer

No this is a small business router. Only the asa routers and other enterprise equipment has that. This has has been very configurable regardless of not having the direct port by port firewall access.

Question 3

Could I access the Cisco IOS if I wanted to configure things manually though a PuTTY Terminal?

Accepted Answer

Yes.. but I stop using these routers. They've had extensive firmware issues with dropping Wan connection. I recommend Mikrotik mikrotik crs125-24g-1s-rm, or Ubiquity USG or USG-PRO.

Question 4

Can I assign ip addys that DHCP hands out?  Can I tell the DHCP to always hand a defined MAC Address a certain ip address?

Accepted Answer

Yes you can assign the IP range that DHCP will use for devices that request addresses.  You can also bind a MAC address to an IP address and reject that MAC if it has another IP address.

Question 5

Is this router capable of attaching an External hard drive for storage?

Accepted Answer

According to the manual, the USB ports are only used for 3G/4G cellular modem dongles; primarily as a backup to the hardwired LAN ports.  They can also be used to store router log files and update the router firmware via a thumb drive.  There is no indication that they support external hard drives for network storage purposes.  I also logged into the router and did not see anything in the setup menus that shows support for hard drives on the USB ports for network storage purposes.

Question 6

Are there any additional license costs per user with this router/firewall?

Accepted Answer

No. It does not have any that i am aware of.  Installed in small physician office online for over 300 days stable.
Multiple vlans setup..... we had no need for vpns in that office but they work... I tested it.  Solid product.

Question 7

Can the dual WANs be used to separate VLAN internet access? For example: VLAN1 is routed through WAN1 and VLAN2 is routed through WAN2. I want a guest network to use one ISP and the private network to use another ISP. I'm not looking for failover. Thanks!

Accepted Answer

Robert,
   Yes they can, but you can accomplish the same result by just establishing the VLANs and assign the ports on the router. I have 3 separate VLANs with different IP blocks and they all have a wireless access point hooked to the port that they are assigned on the router. Depending on which one you connect to, determines the level of access. The network control is through the access points.
   Just a thought. The answer to your question is yes.

Question 8

1) How user friendly is the interface used for configuring this? Is there a browser based interface that a technically inclined IT guy can easily use, or would he need to be a cisco engineer to understand how to configure this?
2) Can the supposedly user friendly DD-WRT firmware be flashed onto this and would this make configuration easier?

Accepted Answer

It is a web based configuration menu through a web browser. I'm my opinion, very user friendly. I am by no means a Cisco guy, but I do IT work for a company and the interface was very easy to use. I used it for setting up VPN between 2 offices, and I had never done VPN before and I successfully set it up on there in about 15 minutes without not really knowing what I was doing. I don't think you need to flash another interface, unless you have your own reasons.

Question 9

Does it have mounting screw holes on the bottom so that it can be mounted on a wall?

Accepted Answer

It comes with "Ears" that can be mounted so they are behind the router. This allows it to mount against the wall.

Question 10

Does this have a built in DNS server? Can you add manual entries?

Accepted Answer

Yes- it has a dns server and you can reserve ip's based on mac address of hosts. We use (2) of these units at our main office and branch, and we connect by the vpn.  They seem to be a good value- better than the homeowner grade hardware and not as complicated as higher end Cisco-Sonic Wall etc. Cisco has some pretty decent docs avail at the product support section of their website. One of our units failed (power surge I think) but they honored the warranty.

Questions & Answers