Your best bet would be to start purchasing routers and switches if you plan on advancing your certs and career. You can always build on them. I would start with a 1710 (get one on ebay for about $130) as you can max the mem and do advanced items with it such as intra-confederation eBGP and VRF-lite. I would also recommend a 2950 so that you can do dot1q in your labs. These items can be used for your home internet connection in addition you your labs. I feel that you will get more benefit out of something like this, as it is not limited like a simulator is. Plus, it can last you a lot longer when you are trying to do labs that there is not a simulator for.
Hope this helps.
Getting Started
Find answers to your questions by entering keywords or phrases in the Search bar above. New here? Use these resources to familiarize yourself with the community:
