Cisco Catalyst 2960 Switch Series and Password Recovery

What is the Cisco Catalyst 2960?

Cisco Catalyst 2960 Series Switches provide services for branches, conventional office workspaces, infrastructure networks and medium-sized campus deployments. The series offer forwarding bandwidth up to 108 Gbps and switching bandwidth(full-duplex) up to 216 Gbps.

This series includes several sub-series: Cisco 2960X, Cisco 2960S, Cisco 2960+, Cisco 2960XR and Cisco 2960L.

Series of Cisco 2960 Switch

1. Cisco 2960X Switch

Cisco Catalyst 2960-X Series are stackable Gigabit Ethernet Layer 2 and Layer 3 access switches. They’re easy to deploy, manage, and troubleshoot. 2960-X offers automated software installation and port configuration. If you want to get the enterprise-class features at a great price, they will help you cut costs with energy-efficient features.

You can learn more at the Cisco 2960X Datasheet.

2. Cisco 2960S Switch

The Cisco Catalyst 2960-S Series Switches are fixed-configuration Gigabit Ethernet switches that provide enterprise-class Layer 2 switching for campus and branch access applications. They enable reliable and secure business operations with lower total cost of ownership through a range of innovative features including FlexStack, Power over Ethernet Plus (PoE+), and Cisco Catalyst SmartOperations.

3. Cisco 2960-Plus Switch

Cisco Catalyst 2960-Plus Series switches deliver reliable and cost-effective network access. These switches are Fast Ethernet switches and provide the operational benefits of Cisco IOS Software for a range of wired access applications, including branches, conventional office workspaces, and infrastructure networks.

You can learn more at the Cisco 2960-Plus Datasheet.

4. Cisco 2960XR Switch

Cisco Catalyst 2960-XR Series Switches are fixed-configuration, stackable Gigabit Ethernet switches that provide enterprise-class access for campus and branch applications. Designed for operational simplicity to lower total cost of ownership, they enable scalable, secure and energy-efficient business operations with intelligent services and a range of advanced Cisco IOS Software features.

You can learn more at the Cisco 2960XR Datasheet.

5. Cisco 2960L Switch

Simplify operations, get the reliability you need, and deliver better mobile experiences to your employees and customers. The Cisco Catalyst 2960-L Series Switch is available in 8-port, 16-port, 24-port and 48-port configurations and supports Power over Ethernet (PoE). Make your network ready for the mobile devices and applications it needs to support with the Catalyst 2960-L, all at a great value.

Cisco 2960 switch Password Recovery

If you want to reset your Cisco 2960 switch password without losing your configuration, you can follow these steps:

1. To reset your Cisco 2960 password, connect your console cable to the switch and open up your terminal emulator software, you can use minicom if you are using Linux. 
2. Power on the switch while holding the mode button. Release the mode button after you see the screen below in your terminal emulator software.

Boot Sector Filesystem (bs) installed, fsid: 2      

Base ethernet MAC Address: 1c:1d:86:db:c8:80        

Xmodem file system is available.

The password-recovery mechanism is enabled.

The system has been interrupted prior to initializing the

flash filesystem.  The following commands will initialize

the flash filesystem, and finish loading the operating

system software:

    flash_init

boot

switch:

3. Initialize the flash file system using the below command.

flash_init

Initializing Flash...                                                          

flashfs[0]: 542 files, 19 directories                                          

flashfs[0]: 0 orphaned files, 0 orphaned directories                           

flashfs[0]: Total bytes: 32514048                                              

flashfs[0]: Bytes used: 13520384                                               

flashfs[0]: Bytes available: 18993664                                          

flashfs[0]: flashfs fsck took 11 seconds.                                      

...done Initializing Flash.

switch:

4. Find the config file in flash: directory

dir flash:

5. The files that we are looking for in the flash: directory is the config.text file.

Directory of flash:/                                                           

    3  -rwx  2296                     vlan.dat                           

    4  -rwx  3569                     config.text                        

    5  -rwx  5                        private-config.text                

    6  drwx  192                      c2960-lanbasek9-mz.122-55.SE7      

  562  -rwx  2072                     multiple-fs    

6. Rename the config file so that it will not be loaded when we boot to the switch.

rename flash:config.text flash:config.text.old

7. Then type the below command to boot to the switch

boot

8. After booting, the switch will ask you to enter the "initial configuration dialog" to initially configure the switch using interactive CLI mode. Just type the word "no" because we are not re-configuring the switch.

         --- System Configuration Dialog ---

Enable secret warning

----------------------------------

In order to access the device manager, an enable secret is required

If you enter the initial configuration dialog, you will be prompted for the enable secret

If you choose not to enter the intial configuration dialog, or if you exit setup without setting the enable secret,

please set an enable secret using the following CLI in configuration mode-

enable secret 0

----------------------------------

Would you like to enter the initial configuration dialog? [yes/no]: no

9. At the switch prompt type en to enter enable mode.

Switch>en

10. Rename the configuration file to its original filename.

rename flash:config.text.old flash:config.text

11. Copy the configuration file into the memory

copy flash:config.text system:running-config

12. Now that the config is loaded in to the memory, we can start changing the password.

conf t
enable secret newpassword

13. After changing the password, save the config and done.

write memory

Source: How to reset Cisco 2960 switch password without losing your configuration