NETGEAR VLAN Routing Configuration: Inter VLAN Routing for Smart Switches

GS752TP, GS728TP, and GS728TPP Gigabit Smart Switches

Configure VLAN Routing with Static Route

VLAN Routing Overview

VLANs divide broadcast domains in a LAN environment. Whenever hosts in one VLAN need to communicate with hosts in another VLAN, the traffic must be routed between them. This is known as inter-VLAN routing. On NETGEAR switches it is accomplished by creating Layer 3 interfaces (switch virtual interfaces [SVI]).

When a port is enabled for bridging (default) rather than routing, all normal bridge processing is performed for an inbound packet, which is then associated with a VLAN. Its MAC destination address (MAC DA) and VLAN ID are used to search the MAC address table. If routing is enabled for the VLAN, and the MAC DA of an inbound unicast packet is that of the internal bridge-router interface, the packet is routed. An inbound multicast packet is forwarded to all ports in the VLAN, plus the internal bridge-router interface, if it was received on a routed VLAN.

Since a port can be configured to belong to more than one VLAN, VLAN routing might be enabled for all of the VLANs on the port, or for a subset. VLAN routing can be used to allow more than one physical port to reside on the same subnet. It can also be used when a VLAN spans multiple physical networks, or when more segmentation or security is required. A port can be either a VLAN port or a router port, but not both. However, a VLAN port might be part of a VLAN that is itself a router port.

Sample VLAN Routing Configuration

To configure a switch to perform inter-VLAN routing:

1.Use the VLAN Configuration screen to enable routing on the switch. For more information, see VLAN Configuration on page 81.

2.Determine the IP addresses you want to assign to the VLAN interface on the switch.

For the switch to be able to route between the VLANs, the VLAN interfaces must be configured with an IP address. When the switch receives a packet destined for another subnet or VLAN, the switch looks at the routing table to determine where to forward the packet. The packet is then passed to the VLAN interface of the destination. It is then sent to the port where the end device is attached.

3.Configure the VLAN interfaces by using VLAN configuration screens.

For information about this, see Sample VLAN Configuration Assign the VLAN the IP address identified using the VLAN routing configuration, for example, IP address 10.1.2.1 and mask 255.255.255.0.

4.Repeat this process for all VLANs to be configured as routing interfaces.

270