In this CCNA Voice article, we will learn about setting up a CCNA voice lab for self study at home to prepare for your CCNA Voice 640-460 exam. We have
learned about various concepts related to voice communication networks in the CCNA voice exam. In the lab setup exercise we will implement the
knowledge in a practical environment which we gathered through running and learning various concepts of voice networking in the CCNA voice exam
articles.
What Routers, Switches and Modules do I need for my CCNA Voice Lab?
As I am sure you have found by your Google searches, there is not a lot of information out there on the CCNA Voice exam. There is even less information on lab scenarios for the CCNA exam. So we created our own
CCNA Voice Lab Workbook and topology for a home lab. We wanted to make it complicated enough to really show you how the traffic flows. So what is requited to follow our lab scenarios? Below we have compiled a list of
equipment used in a our CCNA Voice lab topology. So we will take a moment to describe each peice of the lab and we will look into what
each component does and why it is required. Keep in mind you can replace any of these items with componets that support the same functionality.
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One 2620XM Router 192MB DRAM & 48MB Flash with 12.4 IOS
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One Cisco 2611 64/16 Router
Figure 1 below illustrates the CCNA home voice lab setup scenario which we would going to create using the above mentioned components to setup a voice
infrastructure network.
Figure 1: CCNA home voice lab setup scenario
2620XM Router
– This 2600 series router gives multiservice voice and data integration, support for embedded call processing with cisco CME which we will be using in
our home lab. It will give us support for VIC cards. This will act as CME router in lab setup. The single Ethernet models (2650xm, 2620xm, and 2610xm)
are comparatively cheaper in cost then the two Ethernet models (2651xm, 2621xm, 2611xm) and we don’t need two Ethernet ports for a CME router. However we will need 192MB DRAM & 48MB flash with to support CME and 12.4 IOS for our Voice concepts.
NM-2V
– this is a network voice module which provides the ability to connect directly to PSTN and legacy telephone network to cisco 2600, 3600 and 3700
series routers. It has support for voice interface cards (VICs) to provide the connectivity. In our lab scenario we would be using nm-2v to connect
router 2620XM router. Nm-2v supports four voice calls. Diagram below illustrates nm-2v network module.
It gives features following features such as Voice/fax over IP, Router-based, modular design, High-performance digital signal processing (DSP)
architecture, Cisco IOS® quality of service (QoS) features: Resource Reservation Protocol (RSVP), weighted fair queuing (WFQ), fragmentation, and
interleave, compliant with H.323 (Audio and video conferencing), integrates with existing phone /fax.
It has feature support for 2600, 3600 and 3700 such as Foreign Exchange Office (FXO) answer supervision, FXO disconnect supervision, Cisco Echo
Cancellation (ECAN), Connection trunk, Connection private line, automatic ring down (PLAR), Cisco Hoot and Holler, Cisco Tool Command Language (TCL)
Interactive Voice Response (IVR) Version 2.0, Transparent Common Channel Signaling (T-CCS), Busyout (local voice Busyout [LVBO] and advanced voice
Busyout [AVBO]), Pulse dialing, Inbound hook flash (Foreign Exchange Station [FXS]), Outbound hook flash (FXO), Caller ID (FXS), Cisco Fax Relay, T.38
Fax Relay, T.37 fax store and forward (S&F), Fax /modem pass through and (DTMF) relay.
VIC's are Voice Interface Cards supporting analogue connections for: FXO (to the local telephone exchange); FXS (to an analogue phone) and E&M (to
a PBX)
Vic-2fxo
module – this is a two port voice/fax interface card and gets integrated in 2620XM router which we will be using in our CCNA home lab. VIC-2FXO card
will be used to interface the whole thing with the POTS line coming in to your home and you would be able to connect existing home telephone line into
this module to make and receive calls via your voice lab from your home tele number.
Vic-2fxs
modules – This will be the voice interface card with FXS interface it will connect directly to standard phone, fax machine in the voice network. Cisco
IP Phones - 7960G is nice with 6 buttons, but a two line 7940G will also serve the purpose. Basically we need two phones at a minimum, one should have
as many buttons as you can afford, the other can be a two line or even a lowly one line 7912G if price is a concern. We need to buy power bricks too if
switch isn't PoE. The FXS ports will send the power down the analog phone cables to ring the phones.
In IP phones G stands for global phones use icons on soft keys instead of English text.
We can also have another 26xxXM router with NM-2V and VIC-2FXS card -OR- a 1760 (or 1761-v) with PVDM module and VIC-2FXS card. Maybe even a 1751-v
with VIC-2FXS. If you are looking for a cheap router with DSP's that can support a cheap VIC-2FXS card. With this router you can practice dial peers
with the CME box. The 26xxXM doesn't need max memory, nor does the 1760(v). The NM-2V adds DSP resources to the 26xxXM to support the VIC-2FXS. The
PVDM adds DSP resources to the 1760. The VIC-2FXS allows you to plug a plain old POTS phone in and test dial peers by calling your CME IP Phones.
We don’t need PVDMs for the analogue cards; they're on board the NM-2V from memory.
Cisco 2611
64/16 routers – 2611 64/16 routers will act as an HTTP server in lab environment.
Nm-cue
– In case you don’t want to use an AIM-CUE module (or NM-CUE) then the 1760 is a good and cheaper solution for home lab. Nm-Cue will give functionality
of intuitive prompts, autoattendent and IVR features in the voice environment. CUE would be the license for the voicemail card. An AIM-CUE card will
allow for Voicemail and Autoattendent so if you want this then you will need one. Unity is an alternate Voicemail System.
What is Call Manager & CME?
Cisco Call Manager and CME
– They both are call processing devices. CME will give call processing facility for locally attached IP / analog phones. Call manager supports
centralized whereas as CME supports distributed voice network architecture. Call manager handles hundreds of IP phones centrally and it is a dedicated
server/device.
Call management features are provided in a CME which is router access based. CME is a router with Call manager software installed on it, including some
telephone devices. The CME router will act as a gateway between PSTN and local IP voice network. Lab setup phones (IP / analog) both will be connected
to call manager express router using FXS ports / local LAN switch. In the home lab setup scenario CME would be a better choice in terms of cost and
flexibility. But do remember, we need a XM Series router with at least 192MB of DRAM and 48MB of Flash to support the IOS and CME functionality. Also we can use CME as the SIP trunk gateway between home IP lab network and service provider. We will be learning about SIP server more
in detail below.
What is a SIP Server for my CCNA Security Lab?
SIP server
– SIP proxy is a software application which provides call routing services in voice networks. SIP is a multimedia communication standard and used for
internal IP telephony transit among enterprise voice gateway and SIP capable IP – PBXs and PSTNs. SIP proxy server accepts the registration requests
from SIP endpoints such as IP phones, voice gateways, computer applications. It creates a dynamic record of endpoint’s current contact address. We can
also do static registrations with SIP server.
All calls from PSTN will be handled by a SIP proxy server. Below is the configuration of CME for SIP trunking:
voice service voip
allow-connections sip to sip
sip
registrar server expires max 3600 min 3600
localhost dns:mycompany.test.com
voice class codec 1
codec preference 1 g711ulaw
!— Inbound Translation Rule
!— for Auto Attendant pilot number “500″
voice translation-rule 1
rule 1 /5552222100/ /500/
voice translation-profile AutoAttendant
!— Applied to the inbound dial-peers for AA
translate called 1
!— SIP Trunk Configuration —
dial-peer voice 1 voip
description **Incoming Call from SIP Trunk**
translation-profile incoming AutoAttendant
voice-class codec 1
voice-class sip dtmf-relay force rtp-nte
session protocol sipv2
session target sip-server
incoming called-number .%
dtmf-relay rtp-nte
no vad
dial-peer voice 2 voip
description **Outgoing Call to SIP Trunk**
destination-pattern 9……….
voice-class codec 1
voice-class sip dtmf-relay force rtp-nte
session protocol sipv2
session target sip-server
dtmf-relay rtp-nte
no vad
dial-peer voice 3 voip
description **International Outgoing Call to SIP Trunk**
destination-pattern 9011T
voice-class codec 1
voice-class sip dtmf-relay force rtp-nte
session protocol sipv2
session target sip-server
dtmf-relay rtp-nte
no vad
!— SIP UA Configuration —
sip-ua
authentication username 5552222100 password 075A701E1D5E415447425B
no remote-party-id
retry invite 2
retry register 10
retry options 0
timers connect 100
registrar dns: mycompany.test.com expires 3600
sip-server dns: mycompany.test.com
host-registrar
Now if you follow the topology we described above, you can use our CCNA Voice 640-460 Lab Workbook to walk you through 30 different labs. The
lab workbook builds upon itself so it is imperative that you have similar or better equipment. To make it easy on yourself, we obviously sell the
entire lab kits with all the hardware you need. We have the Standard CCNA Voice Lab which does not have the nm-cue module and we have the Premium CCNA Voice Lab which does include the nm-cue module. Either of these kits will help you acheive your goal of becoming CCNA Voice certified!
This concludes the lesson on setting up your own home lab for the CCNA Voice exam. In this lesson we
learned about different types of equipment which are required to setup your own voice lab.
For many more CCNA Voice articles and videos, we highly suggest you subscribe to our Premium CCNA Content section of our website. Here you will find access to over 350 CCNA, CCNA Security and CCNA Voice articles explaining the most difficult concepts to master. That is not it, you will also have access to over 100 CCNA, CCNA Security and CCNA Voice labs found no where else. Not even in our lab workbooks that we sell. They are only available to our CCNA Premium Content subscribers. But there is more! You also get access to over 60 videos and tons of games to make your CCNA studies fun such as exam questions, flash cards, CCNA Hangman, Jeopardy, Million Dollar Question and much more!
Also please take advantage of our Test Question of the Day service. Have a CCNA, CCNA Voice or CCNA Security exam question sent to your inbox daily with detailed explanations on why each answer is right or wrong.
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