When you are working in a production environment that uses Frame Relay and while you are studying for the CCNA exam, this topic is an important one. You must have a fundamental understanding not only of how to configure Frame Relay but also of the commands to monitor and troubleshoot Frame Relay.

Critical Information

Frame Relay on Cisco routers is both stable and popular. If you want to work in a production environment, the ability to configure and maintain Frame Relay networks is sometimes a prerequisite to landing such a job. Knowing how to monitor and troubleshoot this protocol is a big part of that skill.

There are many ways to check the status of PVCs once you have Frame Relay encapsulation set up and running. Use the show frame-relay ? command at the router prompt to display all the commands you can use to view Frame Relay specifications:

Router#sh frame-relay ?
ip show frame relay IP statistics
lapf show frame relay lapf status/statistics
lmi show frame relay lmi statistics
map Frame-Relay map table
pvc show frame relay pvc statistics
route show frame relay route
svc show frame relay SVC stuff
traffic Frame-Relay protocol statistics

For monitoring purposes, the commands you’ll be using are show frame-relay pvc, show framerelay lmi, show frame-relay traffic, and show interface. Here’s how to use each command:

show frame-relay pvc
Gives the statistics of your PVCs on all configured Frame Relay interfaces.

show frame-relay lmi
Displays the LMI statistics and the LMI type used on your Frame Relay network.

show frame-relay traffic
Shows you the global Frame Relay statistics since the last time the router was booted.

show interface s0
Displays your LMI information and DLCI type (local or switched) but not the DLCI number.

Related posts:

1. Monitor Frame Relay Operation in the Router
2. Commands to Configure Frame Relay LMIs, Maps, and Subinterfaces
3. Frame Relay LMIs, Maps, and Subinterfaces
4. key Frame Relay Terms and Features
5. Monitor and Verify Selected Access list Operations on the Router
6. Examine Router Elements
7. Control Router Passwords, Identification and Banner
8. Manage Router Configuration Files from the Privileged EXEC Mode
9. Log in to a Router in Both User and Privileged Modes
10. RIP Routing Protocol