versatile Cisco router does it all

I have been implementing a network using these for a few months now, and have been very pleased with these routers.

First off though, this model does not have wireless capability like the version shown in the picture. For that, you need the variant with "W-AG" in the model number. I can't review that feature as I only have the non-wireless ones. Other variants in the low 1800 series substitute various DSL/ISDN interfaces for the dual LAN ports that the 1811 and 1812 have.

This router can either be configured using IOS on console or via the SDM web interface. I've only used the IOS interface because it's more fun :) Of course, it is easy to get yourself in trouble configuring IOS without SDM unless you want to learn or already know basic IOS configuration and security. My ease of install/use is based on people in this category, but I am assuming the SDM interface makes it easy for people who go the other route as well.

This router will take care of all the usual router business over its dual fast ethernet ports 0 and 1, including fast routing, hardware crypto acceleration for VPN tunneling, access control, and so forth.

A newer, intriguing feature on this model is the additional 8 fast ethernet ports on back. They are layer 2 switch ports, but by assigning each of them to one or more VLANs the router will route their traffic. You could therefore run a small office entirely off of one of these routers, even with multiple VLANs.

The 32MB flash memory card is on the front panel and can easily be swapped out. The systems come with 128MB of DRAM, which should be adequate well into the future.

There are 2 USB ports on the back, but I don't think they are used for anything yet. The standard console and AUX ports round out the list of interfaces in the back, as well as a V.92 modem for backup connectivity.