Switches, Hubs, and Modems
1748183 Members
3604 Online
108759 Solutions
New Discussion юеВ

DHCP, TRUNK, and RSTP Questions

 
psycho.chicken
Regular Advisor

DHCP, TRUNK, and RSTP Questions

Ok thanks to a few VERY friendly and helpful individuals I got my switches up, and talking, routing etc...! I havent put a gateway of last resort, as they are off the live network though...

woot woot!!!

Network consists of 2 5403's

going down to 2 2900's

down to 5 stacks of 4 - 2650's 48 port
For my test network however... i am only using one 5403 and one 2650

SO... I got the vlan's set up

10 vlan10-d 10.3.10.1 (Workstations)
20 vlan20-d 10.3.20.1 (Workstations)
30 vlan30-d 10.3.30.1 (Workstations)
40 vlan40-d 10.3.40.1 (Workstations)
50 vlan50-d 10.3.50.1 (Workstations)
90 vlan90-d 10.3.0.200 (Servers)
100 vlan100-m 10.3.100.1 (Switch Management)
110 vlan110-v 10.3.110.0 (VoIP Phones - Future)


I understand how a client computer on vlan 1 on stack 1 will have the following ip:
10.3.10.x
255.255.255.0
10.3.10.1
As he is on vlan 10 so his default gateway is the vlan 10.3.10.1

a pc on vlan2 would be

10.3.20.x
255.255.255.0
10.3.20.1

I have them talking by enabling ip routing on the 5403.

My question is on the management vlan...
Do i need one?
My understanding is i give the switched all managemnt vlan ip's
10.3.100.102
10.3.100.103
10.3.100.104
etc

but i cant get my 5403 to take a IP...
It keeps saying incorrect function when i try to give it 10.3.100.100 or 10.3.100.101 etc
I made sure i didnt have a vlan with that ip...

Why is it doing that^^^?

My 5303 contains the gateway of last resort correct? so if all else fails it will be:
0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 10.3.0.1 (if 10.3.0.1 were my pix for example...)

Should i place the pix in it's COMPLETELY own vlan...? or would this be too much traffic routing and un necisarry... I dont think it is best practice to put it in the servers vlan... correct? No point in all the inteent traffic transversing the server vlan...

A Little on DHCP...

I told each vlan the helper ip was 10.3.0.x (DHCP Server) Where do i enable what protocal, DHCP-relay... etc... only on the 5403, or on all the switches/stacks?

RSTP
Do I need to enable this on every stack/switch
(I am led to say YES, but want to verify)

Trunks...
I'm going to connect the switches like the attatched pic, i want these trunks to be redundant, but provide extra bandwidth... So 2 gig ports give me 2 gigs of throughput, not a active/passive port stuff... I'd like the data packets to be able to choose the better of the paths as well... if a data packet starts on the bottom switch, it may be faster a different way then the "shorter" way...

What protocal would this be called?

Is it enabled on each side of the link...

Will RSTP still work with that setup...


What about some of the other commands I see when i do a "?" Are there any other things to enable.. virus throttling etc...

Thanks for the help guy's...
I'm editign a jpg and adding what i haev done and will post it up so you have a point of reference...

I can spell... i just cant type... sorry... I've had 7 years to learn to type and i still cant...
6 REPLIES 6
psycho.chicken
Regular Advisor

Re: DHCP, TRUNK, and RSTP Questions

OK Attatched is teh final layout...

Keep in mind for testing I only have 1 5400 and 1 2650..

Actually I have 2 5400's.. just have one turned on...
psycho.chicken
Regular Advisor

Re: DHCP, TRUNK, and RSTP Questions

Oh and vlan100-m is the "management vlan" and is set us as the management vlan in teh 5400 and 2650
Matt Hobbs
Honored Contributor

Re: DHCP, TRUNK, and RSTP Questions

Okay... here we go:

"My question is on the management vlan...
Do i need one?"

It's a good idea to have one, at least give them all of them an IP address in the same VLAN. To limit access you can use the 'ip authorized-managers' command.

"but i cant get my 5403 to take a IP...
It keeps saying incorrect function when i try to give it 10.3.100.100 or 10.3.100.101 etc
I made sure i didnt have a vlan with that ip..."

Make sure you are not using that IP address range in any other VLAN. Earlier up you mention that VLAN 100 is using 10.3.100.1

"My 5303 contains the gateway of last resort correct?"

Yes, you will set your default route on your 5400's.

"Should i place the pix in it's COMPLETELY own vlan...?"

I would do this, it's a good idea.

"I told each vlan the helper ip was 10.3.0.x (DHCP Server) Where do i enable what protocal, DHCP-relay... etc... only on the 5403, or on all the switches/stacks?"

You would enable an 'ip helper-address' on each VLAN that requires it on the 5400's only (unless there are other switches that are also performing some routing)

"RSTP
Do I need to enable this on every stack/switch
(I am led to say YES, but want to verify)"

Yes you should enable it on each switch.

"Trunks...
I'm going to connect the switches like the attatched pic, i want these trunks to be redundant, but provide extra bandwidth... So 2 gig ports give me 2 gigs of throughput, not a active/passive port stuff... I'd like the data packets to be able to choose the better of the paths as well... if a data packet starts on the bottom switch, it may be faster a different way then the "shorter" way..."

Trunks both standard 'trunk' and 'lacp' load balance by hashing the source-address/destination-address pairs and assigning them to a link. It's a random thing so should even distribute the traffic, the more SA/DA pairs, the more even the distribution should be.

The Trunks that you configure will be seen as one link as far as RSTP is concerned, so will work with this setup.

Meshing is something that is a little more intelligent when it comes to deciding the best path to take, however you can't enable Meshing and routing at the same time so you can forget that.

"What about some of the other commands I see when i do a "?" Are there any other things to enable.. "

It really depends on what you want to do. You should enable sntp to sync the time on your switches, you should use PCM+ to manage your switches, there are a lot of different possibilities.
psycho.chicken
Regular Advisor

Re: DHCP, TRUNK, and RSTP Questions

Thanks Matt,

What about mstp?
I'm reading about it now...


I really would like to have a 2 gig link up from the outer edges to the mid core...

Not just a fail over, but actual throughput...
Matt Hobbs
Honored Contributor

Re: DHCP, TRUNK, and RSTP Questions

With MSTP you can better utilise that bandwidth as certain VLANs will take one link, and the other VLANs will take the other.

Each VLAN though will still be limited to 1gig though, unless you create 2x 2 port trunks back to the mid-level switches.
psycho.chicken
Regular Advisor

Re: DHCP, TRUNK, and RSTP Questions

On the management vlan,wouldnt I create a vlan

vlan100-m 10.3.100.201 /24

and give each of the switches an ip in that range...

10.3.100.119
10.3.100.205
etc
etc