Penetration Testing mailing list archives
RE: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup?
From: <glemmon () onealwebster com>
Date: Mon, 11 Jul 2005 08:27:29 -0400
I use vmware quite a bit and have several base (no configurations, no SPs, no Hotfixes) images on an external usb hard drive which I just copy to the machines and boot into depending on what I am doing. I have a P4, 1Gb RAM which I usually use to run 2 or 3 guest Oses, one compaq 7360 (or something like that) my firewall and my laptop; 2.8GHz proc, 2GB RAM and a 60Gb hdd (this I use when I am away from the home lab mostly). Thinking of expanding - getting me some cisco stuff etc. Gregory -----Original Message----- From: Mike Sweeney [mailto:mikesweeney () packetattack com] Sent: Sunday, July 10, 2005 7:45 PM To: Erin Carroll Cc: pen-test () securityfocus com Subject: Re: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? VMware is king in my lab. I use a P4 3Ghz with 2 gig of RAM and it just works well. The newest 5.0 workstation is very stable. I used version 4.x in my book and I had SuSE, Redhat, Fedora C1 and C2, Slackware and FreeBSD all running on VMware, sometimes multiple images running concurrently. On the Windows side, I have an image of Windows 2003 running the Cisco 3.x Secure Server for RADIUS/TACACS+ work. I also recycled an old Cisco 4230 IDS unit into a test box. It's a dual P3 500 and works pretty well aside from it weighs a ton to move around being a 4U rack mount box. For firewalls, I have different IP table scripts to load, a PIX501 and a m0n0wall router on a WISP card(kicks ass). I have two access points, Cisco 340 and a hacked Linksys. Various switches and hubs laying around. Workstations are a few different intel laptops, my compaq 700M is a fav even though it's only a PIII/800 but it has swappable drives. I have several drives preloaded with different OSs. in a lab, that is very handy and it's handy onsite. I just recently picked up a iMacG5 which I love and I've been using for my daily stuff. Pretty front end and BSD based backend.. you gotta love it. Imaging server? no way dude ;) A firewire/USB2 external drive with Acronis TrueImage works fine and is ALOT cheaper :) I use it on both Wintel and the Linux boxen. I have not tried it on the Mac but then Carbon Copy Cloner works fine for Tiger when run from a command line. I should mention that a switch that supports real VLANs is very handy to mock up a network of different subnets etc. I say real VLANs only because some switches claim they do VLANs but cheeseout on the details. A brand "D" switch does vlans but you can not mirror the VLAN, only a port in the VLAN which kind of sucks at times. Maybe the newer ones are better but I just bought a used Cisco 2900 series and called it done. Mike Sweeney ____________________________________ mikesweeney () packetattack com www.packetattack.com Home of "Network Security using Linux" Office 714.637.4235 On Jul 10, 2005, at 3:42 PM, Erin Carroll wrote:
All, I'm in the process of setting up a pen-test lab environment of several servers running various OS flavors (both Windows & BSD/*nix) along with a netscreen-10 firewall and cisco 3825 to use as the lab router. What do other list members use for their lab environments and what suggestions/ issues have you encountered? I'm just using equipment I have laying around but would be interested in hearing about other lab setups to get some ideas (or excuses to go shopping) on what else I can utilize for pen-testing practice. I'm definitely going to set up an imaging server (jumpstart & Altiris) to make changing things around less painful but I've also considered Vmware on the hosts. Basically I'm curious as to what you all use to practice pen-testing to keep the skills sharp when not "on the job". Thanks! -- Erin Carroll "Do Not Taunt Happy-Fun Ball"
Current thread:
- Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? Erin Carroll (Jul 10)
- RE: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? Nathan Einwechter (Jul 10)
- Re: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? Terry Vernon (Jul 10)
- Re: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? Mike Sweeney (Jul 10)
- Re: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? John Kinsella (Jul 11)
- <Possible follow-ups>
- RE: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? glemmon (Jul 11)
- RE: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? Desai, Dipen (Jul 15)
- RE: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? Erin Carroll (Jul 15)
- RE: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? Lyal Collins (Jul 16)
- Re: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? Tim (Jul 16)
- Re: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? ilaiy (Jul 19)
- RE: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? Erin Carroll (Jul 15)
- RE: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? Billy Dodson (Jul 18)
- RE: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? R. DuFresne (Jul 18)
- RE: Suggested lab materials/systems/setup? Desai, Dipen (Jul 18)