Network design - address assignment

[Lucky Luciano]

Hi

I am not sure if this is right forum, but I have following issue to solve. It was assigned to me new address scope and I would like to divide it according some best practices and somehow that it is immediately visible where part belongs to. I need to decide for net devices, servers, dhcp which part to take for which kind. I am not sure what would be a best idea and if there exist any recommendation if to do it according locations of devices or how to do it. Any help appreciated

[Dan Robinson_4]

This will greatly depend on your existing network environment like how many servers and desktops you plan to have, are there routers and switches already deployed, etc etc.


For a small company you can do something very simple and use 192.168.x.* for your network.
Create a DHCP scope for the clients spanning from 1 to 199. Leave 200 to 250 for servers and other static devices and then 251/252/253/254 can be your gateway to the internet or whatever.

If you have routers and switches and a small DataCenter for the servers, then I would dedicate a subnet to your servers and use multiple subnets (per floor or per building) for the clients and printers. Do DHCP scopes for 1-199 again and leave 200+ for network printers and expansion. Start the printers at 250 and work backwards so you can easily expand your DHCP scope if needed without moving stuff.


If you are designing for a large company or a medium company that will have lots of VPN Links to other companies, I would reccomend buying an entire class C internet routeable subnet and keep all your servers on that (behind a firewall obviuosly) and then use 192.168.*.* or 10.*.*.* for your desktops and printers. This will allow other companies you partner up with to easily access your servers via VPN Tunnel without having to do any network magic with NAT or whatever down the road. Because if your using 10.* and they are using 10.*, how do you know your not going to have conflicts and how do you route the traffic over the VPN Tunnel?


Good luck and feel free to post more questions or information if you need further clarification.

[Edgar Zapata · Accepted solution]

Hello Lucky,

When it comes to designing IP addressing, you had better read part of this document first.
I recommend pages 11 through 19.

http://www.3com.com/other/pdfs/infra/corpinfo/en_US/501302.pdf

You'll have to take into account the fact that your network is more likely going to grow.
You must know how you will manage the IP addressing scheme.

As a general rule, (talking about a class C subnet that allows up to 255 different devices, e.g.: 192.168.0.0/C subnet) you may want to assign IP addresses as follows:
1 - 2 routers
3 - 6 switches, Access Points.
7 - 12 DNS, DHCP, WINS servers.
13- 16 Printers
17-200 Client computers
200-240 laptops
240-245 guests
245-254 development, test labs.

You also may want to make reservations in DHCP but still assign IP config statically in critical servers (DC, DNS, etc).


Hope it helps.
Edgar.

[Lucky Luciano]

Hi

Dan, thanks for pointing out risks when VPN-ing with partners, that is also reason why we are changing it now.
Edgar, I was looking for something similar and what you proposed is more or less what I am going to do, to divide it according functionality.

I was looking for the way how to manage it and to assign IP's so it is more or less immediately visible whose IP is it.

Thanks again

[Lucky Luciano]

Hi

used just peaces, no reasonable way found

Thanks to all