Just like McDonald's workers serve cheeseburgers every day, you will frequently be resetting Cisco switches if you work in networking. Resetting your cisco switch to factory defaults will allow you to configure it again as a new switch. Restoration is always helpful, mainly if your switch configuration has become very complex or if you want to move it from one network to another. We want to provide you information and sample command logs to reset your Cisco 2960 series switches easily.

For those users who can log into their switches.

• Step 1.- Start by connecting your cisco switch via a console cable that will be also connected to the same console.

• Step 2.- Use the following commands:

  Router: en

  Router#erase startup-config

  Router# del flash:vlan.dat

• Step 3.- Reload your cisco switch to complete the restoration.

For those users unable to log into their switches.

• Step 1.- Connect your console cable and power up the cisco switch; then, hold down the MODE button for a few seconds until the initialize prompt appears on the screen.

• Step 2.- Once you see the prompt, enter the following command: flash_init.

• Step 3.- Now, list the files in the flash directory and delete config.text and vlan.dat from it.

• Step 4.- Re-bot the switch, and it will launch the 'System Configuration Dialog', when the restoration is complete.

Tip: You can also restore your cisco switches configuration by copying the text file configuration and then pasting it to the command line.