After much expenditure of effort and capital, I'm happy to announce that the free Packet Life Community Lab is now online!

The lab is a collection of modern networking gear (mostly Cisco) interconnected in a dense generic topology and accessible via remote console. Access to the lab is obtained by registering as a member of the site and creating a reservation for the desired device block(s) and duration. A member can reserve some or all of the lab devices (which currently include Cisco 1841s, 2811s, Catalyst 3550s, and ASA 5505s) for up to eight hours per reservation. For the physical topology and other details, see the lab documentation.

Access to the lab is offered via Telnet and SSH; sessions are bridged directly to the physical console of each device by an Opengear CM4116 console manager. I'd like to thank Opengear for sponsoring this device and their staff for their invaluable support in getting the lab up and running.

The lab is still very much in its beta stage; please report any suspected bugs in the forums. Or, drop by #packetlife on irc.freenode.net for live assistance. (Please remember to consult the Community Lab FAQ first.)

While I am accepting voluntary donations to help cover hardware and operational costs, the lab is completely free for use, provided you register as a member (also free, of course) and agree to the user agreement.

Finally, I feel like it's worth mentioning that I routinely announce things on IRC and Twitter a day or two before I do so on the blog. So if you'd like to be one of the first in the know in the future, that's where to look.