You may also want to get a rack to rack all the equipment as it can get pretty heavy and looks nice and professional when racked. The benefit of getting the older gear is that you can do all this for a few hundred dollars. If you want to learn the new stuff later on it will cost more, but you will know all of the hands on stuff by then and can truly benefit from virtual labs (remotely connected to physical hardware console port).
Pick a rack that is in line with your budget and goals. The vendors are selling older networking gear that will allow you to get hands on knowledge with real hardware to supplement book knowledge.
This way when you are on the job you know exactly what you are doing and if there is something you don't know or understand you can purchase real hardware to rapidly increase your skills. There are some sites that will allow you to remotely connect to networking equipment, but it just is not the same as having the real hardware and it will show when faced with the real deal on the job.
With the high quality managed switches you can see how your apps can affect the network, integrate your work with network connected devices, automate network devices and many more things that wouldn't give you as deep as an understanding when using an unmanaged network (e.g. create your own software that runs on routers, switches, VOIP phones and linux servers).