determine IP address of switch
 

I purchased a Dell PowerConnect 2724 from ebay.

Please help me out and let me know if I did the right stuff here...

The default IP address for managed mode (I confirmed it is in managed mode via the front panel LEDs) is 192.168.2.1 .

I connect a laptop directly to the switch and ran

sudo ifconfig eth0:1 192.168.2.10

which I believe would put me on the same network as the switch. I'm unable to ping 192.168.2.1 or connect via a browser.

If I did this part correctly, this means that the switch is configured to use some other address.

What's the easiest way to figure out this address? Would nmap help?

If you bought it second-hand, chances are that the previous owner changed the default subnet. I looked through the online PDF of the manual for a reset procedure, but could only find instructions for resetting it from the Web interface (which is pretty useless). If there's a hardware reset button physically on the device somewhere, hold it down for about 30 seconds and try again.

No, there's not a hard reset button from what I can see.

That complicates things. What does your routing table look like ("route -n")?

Make a static arp entry for almost any 192 number and then try again. Really any ip should work.
Kind of a way to cheat the ip and force the mac address to some ip range that you want to use.

@jefro: How do I determine the MAC address of the switch?

@CTM: my routing table has no entries

The MAC address is usually stamped onto the device somewhere - check for a sticker on the casing of the switch. It might not be labelled "MAC address", but it's the one that follows the format "01:23:45:67:89:ab".

That goes some way to explaining why nothing's working :) Try jefro's approach for now, it's easier to get it working that way.

Actually the best way was to find the reset button. Some HP and maybe others have some odd way that I forget. It is not a reset button at all. Guess I ought to look that up.

Also if someone did set it as a managed or smart switch it could be very difficult to access it. If the static arp doesn't work then you need to find out how to reset it. Darn, I ought to know this since we have some like that. Might have to use console.

Be sure to remove static arp entries when finished. They are real stinkers if left in.


Side note. If the mac isn't on the switch you usually can just issue arp command to show what is on the lan. arp -a maybe, look that up.

here is the reset: http://en.community.dell.com/support.../17619072.aspx

The fact that this isn't mentioned anywhere in the manual is outrageous. Good catch.

That worked. I thought it was lame that it wasn't in the manual either. Good find.