Free tool to Defragment Hard Disk Faster

The closer the data is to similar data, the better the drive performs. Moving data around to improve speed is called a defrag.

Disk fragments is a primary cause of slow and unstable PC performance.

Though Disk Fragmentation tool is provided with Window Operating Systems and you do or do not fragment your hard disk regularly. You can try Smart Defrag 2 to defragment your hard disk.

What is Auto-MDIX, Its supported Cisco Models and Configuration

Auto-MDIX stands for automatic medium-dependent interface crossover, a feature that lets the interface figure out if the wrong cable is installed. A switch with Auto-MDIX feature enabled, detects the wrong cable and causes the switch to swap the pair it uses for transmitting and receiving, which solves the cabling problem.

When connecting switches without the auto-MDIX feature, you must use straight-through cables to connect to devices such as servers, workstations, or routers and crossover cables to connect to other switches or repeaters. With auto-MDIX enabled, you can use either type of cable to connect to other devices, and the interface automatically corrects for any incorrect cabling.

Free Software to Create / Shrink PDF Files

Hi guys here is the another free and good software I found to Create PDF files faster with the free PDF creator which supports one-click, drag-and-drop PDF creation.
You can Convert to PDF from any file you can print, including Microsoft® Word, Excel®, and PowerPoint® formats.

You can do more with this free Software

Free tool to Reduce Size of your Files/Folder up to 50%

Guys here is the other free tool, 7Zip. Definitely for those who still doesn't know about this great free tool. 

7Zip is a softwares to shrink the file sizes, a very small and free tool to shrink the size of your files or folder up to 50% if you do compress them in the .7z format. 

How to Quickly Find Configuration guides of Any Cisco Device Model

You can quickly find Configuration Examples, and Tech Notes, Configuration Guides and Features guides about any of the CISCO Device (Router, switches etc) from Cisco Website.

Here is how you can get this

Free Tools for Network Monitoring - Part-II

Bandwidth Monitor 2 Lite Edition
Once you've installed Rokario's free Bandwidth Monitor 2 Lite Edition on any PC on your network, it will track bandwidth use in real time. The program displays download bandwidth use, upload bandwidth use, and total bandwidth. It also keeps logs of bandwidth use, so you can retain a historical record.

Install it on every PC on your network and then check the results--especially the historical records of bandwidth use--regularly on each PC. That way, you can see whether any bandwidth hogs are wallowing on your network. Based on that, you can try to reduce its excess demand.

List of Ports and their description from 0 to 1023

List of Ports Used in Networking From 0-To-1023-PORTSFor your reference find below the list of Port numbers and their Descriptions, where they are used. A file to keep for quicker reference for port numbers

Free tools for Network Monitoring - Part-I

Network Magic Essentials and Network Magic Pro
Anyone who has a home network will welcome Cisco Systems' free Network Magic Essentials, a software collection full of useful tools designed for home network users who don't have IT experience. You'll find a network map for displaying all of the devices on your network, and vital information about each one, including its IP address, hardware configuration, and software configuration. You also get some very good troubleshooters for fixing broken network connections and performing other maintenance tasks.

Cisco Learning Labs - Practice Labs before appearing for Your Cisco Exam

You can now access real Cisco Labs with routing and layer 2 core switching features, practice your labs any time to have good skills of router and switches configuration all online at Cisco but remeber again you have to pay for it before availing this service.

But the prices to labs looks cheap as comared to buying your personal routers and switches to practice on.

Can a VTP Client advertise and cause other swithces to flush good VLAN records?

The answer is YES.
Aa switch acting as a VTP server could come online with a higher configuration revision number and can replace all vlan configurations with its own higher revision number configs. But the same can be done by a switch acting as a client and powers up with a higher revision!

Why Extended-Range VLANs are not supported or transported by VTP Ver 1 & 2?

Normal-Range and Extended-Range VLANs

Normal-range VLANs are VLANs 1–1005, and can be advertised via VTP versions 1 and 2. These VLANs can be configured in VLAN database mode, with the details being stored in the vlan.dat file in Flash.

Extended-range VLANs range from 1006–4094, inclusive. However, these additional VLANs cannot be configured in VLAN database mode, nor stored in the vlan.dat file, nor advertised via VTP. They can only be configured when the switch is in VTP transparent mode.

Now answering the question that why Extended range VLANs are not transported by VTP 1
& 2, is because originally, ISL began life only supporting normal-range VLANs, using only 10

Benefits/Improvement in VLan Trunking Protocol, VTP V3.0

Here is the list of some of the major Improvement done in the VLAN Trunking Protocol Version 3.0

• The new version of VTP offers better administrative control over which device is allowed to update other devices' view of the VLAN topology. The chance of unintended and disruptive changes is significantly reduced, and availability is increased. The reduced risk of unintended changes will ease the change process and help speed deployment.

• Functionality for the VLAN environment has been significantly expanded. Two enhancements are most beneficial for today's networks:

• In addition to supporting the earlier ISL VLAN range from 1 to 1001, the new version supports the whole IEEE 802.1Q VLAN range up to 4095.
  

The 10 Most Important Moments in Microsoft’s Operating Systems

Windows 1.0 
Released on November 20, 1985, the original Windows was better known by its more formal name: MS-DOS Executive. The OS environment/GUI included a calendar, clipboard, calculator, and more. Unfortunately, the windows in this 1.0 release couldn’t overlap. The patent for that feature was owned by Apple at the time.

Windows 2.0 
Released two years later in October 1987, this version featured overlapping windows like the Apple OS, albeit in a chunkier, more DOS-y looking way. The end result was an Apple
lawsuit that lasted for almost 10 years. It’s worth noting that both Windows 1.0 and 2.0 were more GUI than OS—DOS still handled all fi le-system services and data requests. In defense of the GUI, it was paired with a fairly fl exible virtual memory system, which allowed for multitasking functionality that was ahead of its time.

Dead Networking Technologies

Here are some networking technologies that are dead or almost!
 

Token Ring

Token Ring supported a maximum data rate over cable of 4Mb/s when it was introduced in 1985. In 1989, IBM shipped a new version capable of 16Mb/s. The technology reached 100Mb/s in 1999; but Fast Ethernet offered the same speed with simpler infrastructure requirements

802.11a

Some multiband routers still support 802.11a, introduced in 1999, but it has terrible range and is no faster than 802.11g.

Secure your Microsoft Windows Network, Quick Steps

Uninstall Unnecessary Software/Applications
The more code that’s running on a machine, the greater the chance that the code will be exploitable. You should therefore uninstall any unnecessary operating system components and applications.

Beware of Free and low cost Applications
Do you know some free or low cost applications are designed to serve ads to users; others are designed to steal personal information from users or track their Internet browsing habits. So do a research on such type of applications before installing them.

Difference b/w a Router and Multilayer Switch, Their correct Usage and Installation

I placed few questions on Cisco forum to discuss the differences between the usage of a Router and Multilayer switch.

There were my questions;

Today’s Multilayer switches are versatile; they can do all the things a router can do;

• Will Router be eliminated by Multilayer Switches?

• Are there any limitations to a Multi-layer switch that it can not completely replace a router?

• If both functions can be done by a multilayer switches then why a router is still produced?

• Will in future be only one device in the market that will do Routing+switching, and will there be no separate Switch or Separate router?

Hardening a Network (Securing Router/Switch)

Hardening a Network is a term used to describe steps taken to secure your network (router/switch) configurations from any type of attacks of rouge hackers. Also Hardening is disabling of unwanted services and enabling of only services that are required by a company to reduce security threats

I am listing some of the actions that are taken to harden your network or devices;

• Using a complex passwords that are long and use combination of special characters that are very hard to be cracked by hackers using cracking tools
• Creating formal policies and security audits of the network to measure and identify any vulnerabilities to attacks from hackers.