Can't get in my own router

[michael.ball]

It's a spare that was sitting by my desk; I had been in it previously and can't understand why now I cannot get a proper console session going with 9600, 8,n,1 even though this console setup works perfectly when I plug the connector into a spare switch. All I get on the hyperterminal screen is garbage characters but the router seems to boot fine as I can telnet to the expected IP. However here I am stuck also because it appears someone has put a username and password on it. I suspect somebody with too much time on their hands has baffled me, can anybody help me out here ??

[Richard Burts]

Michael

The symptom of getting garbage characters on the screen when you attempt console access sounds like the console speed has been changed. I would suggest that you try the various speeds (9600, 4800, 2400, and 1200). With Hyperterm it is frequently helpful to stop and start Hyperterm each time you change the speed.

If someone has changed login authentication it may be necessary to do password recovery to ignore the configuration and let you into the router.

HTH

Rick

[michael.ball]

Thanks Rick, yes I agree with everything you said and I have tried a few different speeds and other parameters. However unless I can see what's happening on the console I cannot interupt the router or get to the point where I can change the password. Doe anybody know of a utility that can detect what terminal settings the route is expecting?

[Richard Burts · Accepted solution]

Michael

I believe that you are in a difficult situation: if you could telnet to the router then you could look at the config register and at the config and could find what the console speed is set for. But you can not telnet because of the password that is set. So you need to do password recovery. But you can not do password recovery because you have not yet matched the console speed. Each problem gets in the way of solving the other problem.

I suggest that you systematically go through all the console speeds, remembering that it may be helpful to stop and restart Hyperterm each time you change the console speed.

What model of router is this? The reason for asking is to try to determine whether there are the 4 standard console speeds, or whether the extended range of console speeds is supported.

HTH

Rick

[michael.ball]

Well I finally got into the router. I managed to connect at 115200, changed the config register and got in and found the password and then changed the config register back - at which point the router needed to be reset so I powered it off and on. I did not change anything else on the router but oddly enough when it came back up I now needed to connect at 9600 which of course is what we normally use anyways.

[networking]

You should be able to set thre register to 0x2102. http://www.cisco.com/warp/public/474/pswdrec_2500.html