Solved: WAE 512 appliance Serial Console Cable

Acid · ‎06-26-2010

Hi Everyone,

Am a newbie in Cisco WAAS and wanted to ask..........................

What kind of serial console cable do i use to access the Cisco WAE 512 appliance?

I have the normal cisco console cable can this work?

Regards,

Sidi

Tod Larson · ‎06-28-2010

Sidi,

Here are some things that helped me get started.

Read this docum regarding the setup of a WAE.

http://docwiki.cisco.com/wiki/Cisco_WAAS_4.1.1_--_Cisco_Wide_Area_Application_Services_Quick_Configuration_Guide

Search Youtube for WAAS Demos. You'll find lots of people who have setup demonstration that will give you an idea of what to expect.

Your 3 WAAS devices will be configured in this manner...

One device configured as a Central Manager (probably in your data center)

One device configured as an Application Accelerator colocated with your Central Manager.

One device configured as an Application Accelerator on your branch site.

For the demo you'll need either a WAN simulator or a real WAN connection between the data center and the branch accelerators. 50 ms latency is probably the minimum to get a good WOW factor. If you have a simulator go ahead and crank it up to 100-200 ms latency. I've been doing demos using 3-6MB files over a 100ms link. This shows the customer how a non-accelerated file takes 4+ minutes to transfer, while an accelerated file takes about 10 seconds or so.

For testing or demo you can configure an access list on your routers at each site to allow only IP address to be accelerated. This way you are only affecting one host's traffic. Then when you are comfortable you can widen the IP range or put an any any statement at the end.

ip wccp 61 redirect-list waas-wae

ip wccp 62 redirect-list waas-wae

ip access-list exended waas-wae

permit ip any host 10.1.1.1 <-- this is the ip address of the host at that site you want to be part of the demo.

permit ip host 10.1.1.1 any

Hopefully this can get you started.

Tod

View solution in original post

Tod Larson · ‎06-26-2010

Our appliances came with a cisco blue rollover cable (RJ48's on both ends) and 2 RJ48 to 9pin serial converters. The appliance (it's really a regular old server but they like the buzzword) has a normal 9pin serial connection in the back. I assume the regular old cisco console cable (RJ48 on one end and 9pin on the other) will work, then you'd only need 1 RJ48-9pin converter.

http://docwiki.cisco.com/wiki/Cisco_WAAS_4.1.1_--_Cisco_Wide_Area_Application_Services_Quick_Configuration_Guide#Configuring_the_WAAS_Central_Manager

Note: If you are connecting to the WAAS device using a PC as the console, the PC must have terminal emulation software installed. The terminal emulation software should be configured with the following parameters: 9600 baud, 8 data bits, no parity bits, and 1 stop bit. You must use a console connection rather than a Telnet session for the initial configuration of these basic device network settings on the WAE. Once you have used a console connection to define the device network settings, you can use a Telnet session for subsequent CLI sessions. By default, the Telnet service is enabled on a WAAS device.

I hope this helps.

Acid · ‎06-27-2010

Hi Tod,

Thanks for your reply i`ll try to look for that converter and get back to you once successful.

Though i wanted to ask something else,

I have been given a task to do a POC for a customer but i havent configured a Cisco WAE before,

as i have read so far i understand that i should configure it in inline mode as it is the best way to do

a POC.

I have three WAE 512 appliances and am totally confused on where to start from any advise on this?