VLAN Routing Help

Question

I am trying to get my head around VLAN config. I have a load of Netgear GS728TP switches accross my site, and I'm trying to get some devices moved to alternative VLANs because I have exhausted the /24 network pool assigned currently.

I have got VLAN trunking working between switches, so my Visitor WIFI VLAN (50) is now able to have an ADSL router plugged into one switch, and on other swithes connected via trunk links there are APs putting clients onto VLAN 50 - they are able to get their IP address from DHCP on the ADSL router which is what I needed.

Now I am trying to move a bunch of about 30 IP cameras to VLAN 20. I need to be able to route between the IP cameras, and the NVR device which will stay on VLAN1 (well, it could move to VLAN20 once the routing is working..)

What I have done so far, is decide on 1 switch as my "master" - it's a GS752TP. I have setup an IP address of 192.168.20.1 on VLAN20. What I can't do, is setup an IP address of 192.168.16.1 on VLAN1, as it says that the IP address interface is duplicated.

In the ARP table of my master switch, I can see the single IP camera that I've addressed as 192.168.20.10 and configured to be on VLAN20 - but I cannot ping it from either the master switch, or the one that it's plugged into - should I be able to?

Many Thanks Mark

Answer 1

It sounds as if you've duplicated subnets somewhere. You can't have overlapping subnets on two different VLANs. Check to make sure that VLANs 1, 20 and 50 are all different subnets.

I assume only the master switch has addresses on the VLAN interfaces. In that case, you should be able to ping from the master. You either have a trunking problem, or your addressing is wrong -- which might explain the first problem.

Posting the master switch configuration would be helpful to find the problem.

Answer 2

When you are setting up a VLAN with a subnet and wanted routed you need to set a Layer 3 interface which will act as the default gateway.

I'm unfamiliar with the netgear as I mainly work on cisco, but on a Layer 3 device you need to have the IP.

So it should look something like.

interface VLAN 1
  desc VLAN 1 
  ip address 192.168.16.254 255.255.255.0
interface VLAN20
  desc IP Cameras
  ip address 192.168.20.254 255.255.255.0

Once that is done you need to make sure the DHCP server is giving out the proper subnet mask and gateway IP.

Then make sure that the device is assigned to whatever VLAN you need.

IE, port 1/0/1 assigned to vlan 20 and so on.

Answer 3

Each endpoint, e.g. camera, must be configured with IP addressing info. This is best done automated by using a DHCP server which tells each device it's IP address, subnet mask, default gateway, DNS server(s), etc. Sometimes there are other optional parameters delivered via DHCP. Check your camera documentation for "DHCP option".

Other than that, it's basic networking. If you have changed the network device configuration, you might power cycle them as old configuration parameters can sometimes remain cached (in memory) and cause issues. Same goes for the endpoints. Hopefully your cameras are powered via PoE so when you reboot the network, you'll be rebooting the cameras too.