Thursday, September 10, 2015

Setup csr1000v on VirtualBox

Setup csr1000v on VirtualBox

For this router I had a lot of difficulties on determining the right setup so I can have all the functionality ( service instance, correct interface mapping to GNS3 ports ).

We will need:
    - GNS3 v1.3.10
    - Virtual Box 5.0.4 or latest
    - csr1000v image , you can download it from here

Note!!! csr1000v image comes in IOS format or OVA, if you can't download the ISO image but you can download the .ova , simply go with .ova file open the file with 7zip and extract the ISO image from it.

Step 1:  we need to build a blank VM, with the following parameters:
    - OS Type : Linux / Other Linux (64-bit)
    - System:
          - Memory : 4096 MB
          - Processors : 1vCPU
          - Acceleration :
                - Paravirtualization Interface : KVM
                - Hardware : VT-x/AMD-v - Nested Paging
     - Storage : 8GB - dynamic blank image
     - CD-ROM : select the csr1000v image
     - Network :
                 - Not attached
                 - Adapter Type: virtino-net
                 - Promiscuous Mode : Allow All
     - Serial:
                 - Port Mode : Host Pipe
                 - Path/Address : \\.\pipe\csr1000v

Step 2: Boot up the device , it will start installing the IOS-XE on the VM storage.

Step 3: Once the IOS-XE , boot the device and you will receive a prompt with "Router>". At this point the console is directed to the VGA, we need to make the console accessible from serial.

In the VM window , configure the router with the following commands :

     Router>enable
     Router#conf t
     Router(conf)#platform console serial
     Router(conf)#exit
     Router#copy run start
     Router#reload

Step 4: Power off and on the VM , and open a putty window. In Putty select Serial connection and in Serial line select "\\.\pipe\csr1000v"





3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Nice post.
Have you got bdi working between gns3 routers and csr?
I have no issues with dot1q but as soon as I use BDI on csr the communication stops.
Using same versions of software as you mentioned . CSR 13.00 to 13.6 have been tried.
Thanks

Alex said...

Hi,

Sorry for my late reply , this was something where I got stuck in the past , used to use the sub-interfaces on IOS, I have tried the bellow config between two routers and it worked with the same setup from the post. If you have a specific case which doesn't work send it and I'll try it out.

interface GigabitEthernet1
no ip address
negotiation auto
service instance 100 ethernet
encapsulation dot1q 100
rewrite ingress tag pop 1 symmetric
bridge-domain 100
!
end
interface BDI100
ip address 10.0.0.1 255.255.255.0
end

Dr.life said...

hello I have a probleme is that I use this routeur in GNS3 and the interfaces are down/down even after no shutdown so I'm wondering is there any setting to do?
thank you