EIGRP Configuration for CCNA

Students

Posted on February 18, 2013

by Rene Molenaar
in CCNA R&S, Cisco, EIGRP
EIGRP is one of the routing protocols you need to master if you want to pass the Cisco CCNA exam. In this article
Ill walk you through the configuration. If you have no idea what EIGRP is or how it works you should read
my Introduction to EIGRP first. This is the topology that we will use:

In the topology above I have 4 routers. All interfaces are FastEthernet with the exception of the link between router
KingKong and Carl, thats where we use an Ethernet link. Behind router Preston there is a loopback interface.

Lets start by configuring EIGRP between router KingKong and Ann:

KingKong(config)#router eigrp 1
KingKong(config-router)#no auto-summary
KingKong(config-router)#network 192.168.13.0
Ann(config)#router eigrp 1
Ann(config-router)#no auto-summary
Ann(config-router)#network 192.168.13.0
Configuring EIGRP is similar to RIP. The 1 is the AS number and it has to be the same on all routers! We require
the no auto-summary command because by default EIGRP behave classful and we want it to be classless. After
typing in these commands this is what you will see:

KingKong#
%DUAL-5-NBRCHANGE: IP-EIGRP(0) 1: Neighbor 192.168.13.3 (FastEthernet0/0) is
up: new adjacency
Ann#
%DUAL-5-NBRCHANGE: IP-EIGRP(0) 1: Neighbor 192.168.13.1 (FastEthernet0/0) is
up: new adjacency
Our routers have become EIGRP neighbors. We can also verify this with a command:

KingKong#show ip eigrp neighbors

IP-EIGRP neighbors for process 1
H
Address
Interface
0
192.168.13.3
Fa0/0
Ann#show ip eigrp neighbors
IP-EIGRP neighbors for process 1
H
Address
Interface
0

192.168.13.1

Fa0/0

Hold Uptime
SRTT
(sec)
(ms)
12 00:11:58 1275

RTO

Q Seq
Cnt Num
5000 0 3

Hold Uptime
SRTT
(sec)
(ms)
14 00:11:47
15

RTO

Q Seq
Cnt Num
200 0 3

Use show ip eigrp neighbors to verify that we have a working EIGRP neighbor adjacency. This seems to be the case.
Lets configure all the network commands so all routers become EIGRP neighbors and advertise their networks:
KingKong(config)#router eigrp 1
KingKong(config-router)#network 192.168.12.0
Ann(config)#router eigrp 1
Ann(config-router)#network 192.168.34.0
Carl(config)#router eigrp 1
Carl(config-router)#no auto-summary
Carl(config-router)#network 192.168.12.0
Carl(config-router)#network 192.168.24.0
Preston(config)#router eigrp 1
Preston(config-router)#no auto-summary
Preston(config-router)#network 192.168.24.0
Preston(config-router)#network 192.168.34.0
Preston(config-router)#network 4.0.0.0

These network commands will activate EIGRP on all interfaces and advertise all networks that we have. Lets verify
our work:

KingKong#show ip eigrp neighbors

IP-EIGRP neighbors for process 1
H
Address
Interface
1
192.168.12.2
Et1/0
0
192.168.13.3
Fa0/0
Carl#show ip eigrp neighbors
IP-EIGRP neighbors for process 1
H
Address
Interface
1
192.168.24.4
Fa1/0
0
192.168.12.1
Et0/0
Ann#show ip eigrp neighbors
IP-EIGRP neighbors for process 1
H
Address
Interface
1
192.168.34.4
Fa1/0
0
192.168.13.1
Fa0/0
Preston#show ip eigrp neighbors
IP-EIGRP neighbors for process 1
H
Address
Interface
1
0

192.168.34.3
192.168.24.2

Fa1/0
Fa0/0

Hold Uptime
SRTT
(sec)
(ms)
14 00:20:08
12
11 00:43:34 428

RTO

Q Seq
Cnt Num
200 0 15
2568 0 12

Hold Uptime
SRTT
(sec)
(ms)
12 00:19:22
12
13 00:20:17
10

RTO

Hold Uptime
SRTT
(sec)
(ms)
14 00:19:29
8
12 00:43:53
9

RTO

Hold Uptime
SRTT
(sec)
(ms)
12 00:19:39 658
14 00:19:42 537

RTO

Q Seq
Cnt Num
200 0 14
200 0 15
Q Seq
Cnt Num
200 0 13
200 0 14

Q Seq
Cnt Num
3948 0 13
3222 0 16

Each router has two EIGRP neighbors so this is looking good. Now let me show you the routing table of router
KingKong:

KingKong#show ip route eigrp

4.0.0.0/24 is subnetted, 1
D
4.4.4.0 [90/158720] via
D
192.168.24.0/24 [90/33280]
D
192.168.34.0/24 [90/30720]

subnets
192.168.13.3, 00:21:48, FastEthernet0/0
via 192.168.13.3, 00:21:53, FastEthernet0/0
via 192.168.13.3, 00:21:50, FastEthernet0/0

The first thing you might notice is that you see a D for the EIGRP entries. The reason that you see a D and not
an E is that the last one is already taken for EGP, an old routing protocol that we dont use anymore. D stands
for dual which is the mechanism behind EIGRP. Lets take a closer look at one of these entries:

4.4.4.0 [90/158720] via 192.168.13.3, 00:21:48, FastEthernet0/0

What exactly do we see here?

4.4.4.0 is the network that we have learned.
90 is the administrative distance for EIGRP.
158720 is the metric, this is the feasible distance that you see.
Via 192.168.13.3 is the next hop IP address. In this case its router Ann.
The metric that EIGRP uses isnt as easy as OSPF or RIP, the numbers to work with are very large.

Why did router KingKong decide to use the link through router Ann in order to get to network 4.4.4.0 /24? The
answer is in the EIGRP topology table:

KingKong#show ip eigrp topology

IP-EIGRP Topology Table for AS(1)/ID(192.168.12.1)
Codes: P - Passive, A - Active, U - Update, Q - Query, R - Reply,
r - reply Status, s - sia Status
P 4.4.4.0/24, 1 successors, FD is 158720
via 192.168.13.3 (158720/156160), FastEthernet0/0
via 192.168.12.2 (412160/156160), Ethernet1/0
Use show ip eigrp topology to see the EIGRP topology table. This is an important command so let me describe
what we have here
P 4.4.4.0/24, 1 successors, FD is 158720
The first line tells us that we have a successor. We already knew this because we saw it in the routing table. FD is
the feasible distance to reach 4.4.4.0 /24.

via 192.168.13.3 (158720/156160), FastEthernet0/0

Above you see two important numbers:
158720 is the feasible distance.
156160 is the advertised distance.
via 192.168.12.2 (412160/156160), Ethernet1/0
Above you see the information for the feasible successor (router Carl):
412160 is the feasible distance.
156160 is the advertised distance.
The reason that this is a feasible successor is because the advertised distance (156160) is lower than the feasible
distance of the successor (158720)
So to summarize what we have seen:

Router KingKong knows how to reach network 4.4.4.0 /24.

The path through router Ann is the successor because the feasible distance is 158720.
The path through router Carl is the feasible successor because the advertised distance (156160) is lower than
the feasible distance of the successor (158720).
Right now only the successor is in the routing table but we activate load balancing so that the feasible successor will
also be used. This is how we do it:

KingKong#show ip eigrp topology

IP-EIGRP Topology Table for AS(1)/ID(192.168.12.1)
Codes: P - Passive, A - Active, U - Update, Q - Query, R - Reply,

r - reply Status, s - sia Status

P 4.4.4.0/24, 1 successors, FD is 158720
via 192.168.13.3 (158720/156160), FastEthernet0/0
via 192.168.12.2 (412160/156160), Ethernet1/0
The feasible successor will be used if its feasible distance is lower than the feasible distance multiplied with a
multiplier.
158720 x 3 (multiplier)= 476160
412160 (feasible successor) is lower than 476160 so we will use this feasible successor.

KingKong(config)#router eigrp 1
KingKong(config-router)#variance 3
I need to use the variance command to set this multiplier. Lets check our routing table now:

KingKong#show ip route eigrp

4.0.0.0/24 is subnetted, 1 subnets
D
4.4.4.0 [90/158720] via 192.168.13.3, 00:00:37, FastEthernet0/0
[90/412160] via 192.168.12.2, 00:00:37, Ethernet1/0
Great! Now we see both entries in the routing table. You have now seen how EIGRP selects the successor, feasible
successor and how to enable load balancing over feasible successors. Thats all I have for you, I hope this was useful
to you and if you have any questions please leave a comment!