A long while back, a friend of mine gave me a 24 Port 10/100 3COM switch.
It was quite nice of him, but I couldn’t get access to this switch.

It had a management port on it, so I had to go out and buy a NULL-MODEM adapter to use it.

It looks just like this:

And alas, I was able to gain access to the switch and reset it, so I could get into its Web UI.

I got over this switch very shortly afterwards, it was only 10/100 so I put it aside.

Here we are 2 or so years later, and I am donated a massive load of Servers + Switches from an old Call Center.
Its really enterprise grade stuff.

I found myself doing a scan of 10.0.0.0/8 trying to get into the switches again, and came short.

Off to the old draws to find the handy NULL-MODEM hack connection, and we have a winner! Default password too.

However these switches aren’t so easy, and most commands have to be done via the CLI. Which is amazing. I do not know the link between ExtemeNetworking and Cisco, but they are VERY similar.

These switches will help with my CCNA!
I plan to add a lot more stuff once I get up and running with the rest of the hardware we now have. We have over 10 new servers to play with!