
It will automatically name the device Etherswitch router, and place into the Switches device category, instead of Routers. On the screen where you’re asked to name the router, select the “This is an Etherswitch router” option (this is important!). Choose Yes, as it will load faster, instead of decompressing every time you start the image: You’ll be asked if you’d like to decompress this image. Select New Image, and click Browse to locate the image in your filesystem (you must supply your own!). (You can also run this image via the GNS3 VM) Pick run this IOS image via the local computer, and click Next >:

This example will use a c3725 router IOS image, but the same steps apply if using the other three platforms listed above.įirst, click Edit->Preferences->IOS Routers->New in the GNS3 GUI. Refer to the switching section of this document to see what features will be unavailable to you.


This is a rather simple process, but be aware that your options for configuring Cisco switching while using a c3640, c3660, c3725, and c3745 for this are quite limited. Using a c3725 as an “Etherswitch Router” You can also use switches from other vendors such as Cumulus, Extreme Networks and many more. Use it only for basic operations Open vSwitch īy leveraging GNS3 support for Docker, you can now add Open vSwitch to your GNS3 topologies. It’s not running a switch OS, everything is emulated from scratch. While an Etherswitch module does not support advanced layer 2 features, it does allow you to configure basic VLANs, Spanning Tree and other options. This is the official Cisco way of emulating a switch. With a Cisco VIRL IOSvL2 image, you can configure and test a wide range of advanced switching features. Recommended_switching_platform Cisco VIRL IOSvL2

Your selection of image and platform will affect what is possible. While this was true in the past, GNS3 now supports options such as:Ĭomplimentary campus technologies such as HSRP are also supported. One common misconception about GNS3 is that GNS3 does not support advanced switching options.
