Hi folks, I did attempt a google for this but did not know what search term would actually pull up a meaningful result for this.
Apparatus/Equipment. a) SMC wireless dsl router (3 port) b) three 8 port switches, (dlink, dax, smc)
Setup: 4 ports in each are used to connect to various PCs. 1 port used up to connect to the wireless router.
Problem: I have had issues with routers where frequent reseting is required. So to prevent the entire internal network going down because of a bad router, I decided to make the connections redundant.
So connected Port 6 of dlink to port 6 of Dax. Port 7 of dlink to port 6 of smc. Port 7 of dax to port 7 of smc with the assumption that even if the router fails, i'l have uninterrupted access.
But this was not to be. Things got messed up, despite enabled connections, machines would not ping each other or the router.
Then finally removed the links from Switch 1 and 2 to the router and also the connection from dax to smc and it started working fine.
So what got messed up in the above setup? I am thinking its something to do with conflicts but not convinced as to why there would be a conflict?
Can anyone throw some light on this?
thanks abhi
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Abhishek Daga wrote:
Setup: 4 ports in each are used to connect to various PCs. 1 port used up to connect to the wireless router.
Problem: I have had issues with routers where frequent reseting is required. So to prevent the entire internal network going down because of a bad router, I decided to make the connections redundant.
So connected Port 6 of dlink to port 6 of Dax. Port 7 of dlink to port 6 of smc. Port 7 of dax to port 7 of smc with the assumption that even if the router fails, i'l have uninterrupted access.
But this was not to be. Things got messed up, despite enabled connections, machines would not ping each other or the router.
Are you sure you can have parallel network routing, like between switches as well as an extra route through the router? How will the packets flow?
It may be irrelavant but did you use straight and cross cable conventions for the respective devices?
Regards,
Rony.
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On 2/27/06, Rony Bill ronbillypop@yahoo.co.uk wrote:
It may be irrelavant but did you use straight and cross cable conventions for the respective devices?
Shouldn't matter. Most switches auto detect the config.
--- Dinesh A. Joshi
On Sun, 2006-02-26 at 09:19 -0800, Abhishek Daga wrote:
Hi folks, I did attempt a google for this but did not know what search term would actually pull up a meaningful result for this.
I tried http://www.google.co.in/search?hl=en&q=ethernet%2Bstandards to read up on the basics.
Setup: 4 ports in each are used to connect to various PCs. 1 port used up to connect to the wireless router.
Problem: I have had issues with routers where frequent reseting is required. So to prevent the entire internal network going down because of a bad router, I decided to make the connections redundant.
So connected Port 6 of dlink to port 6 of Dax. Port 7 of dlink to port 6 of smc. Port 7 of dax to port 7 of smc with the assumption that even if the router fails, i'l have uninterrupted access.
I think one can only cascade unmanaged hubs/switches. The above topology was causing confusion within the switches, especially the wireless router (connected to all three switches) as to which port of the two ports to send the ethernet frame. I think only intelligent hub/switches can figure out paths for transmission, reserving the others for fail overs.
On 2/27/06, Arun K. Khan knura@yahoo.com wrote:
I think one can only cascade unmanaged hubs/switches. The above topology was causing confusion within the switches, especially the wireless router (connected to all three switches) as to which port of the two ports to send the ethernet frame. I think only intelligent hub/switches can figure out paths for transmission, reserving the others for fail overs.
I think the OPs terminology is a bit confusing as well. Is he using switches? What kind of switches is he using? or is he using routers? again what kind? whats the model no? and why is he required to frequently reboot them?
--- Dinesh A. Joshi
On Mon, 2006-02-27 at 23:50 +0530, Dinesh Joshi wrote:
On 2/27/06, Arun K. Khan knura@yahoo.com wrote:
I think one can only cascade unmanaged hubs/switches. The above topology was causing confusion within the switches, especially the wireless router (connected to all three switches) as to which port of the two ports to send the ethernet frame. I think only intelligent hub/switches can figure out paths for transmission, reserving the others for fail overs.
I think the OPs terminology is a bit confusing as well. Is he using switches? What kind of switches is he using? or is he using routers? again what kind? whats the model no? and why is he required to frequently reboot them?
Agree with your last question about rebooting the router - why?
As for the topology, I understood what the OP was trying to say. This is what I understood.
WAN | | ====== A (DSL router w/WLAN and 3 wired port switch)
========== B (8 wired port switch)
========== C (8 wired port switch)
========== D (8 port switch)
(1) A - is connected to B, C, and D (2) B - is connected to C and A as in (1) (3) C - is connected to D and A as in (1) (4) D - is connected to B and A as in (1)
The only thing that was not clear to me was whether he is using intelligent switches or vanilla unmanaged switches. From the little I read about ethernet topology, I don't think above is kosher and that is why things were not working.
B, C, and D cascaded with any _one_ of them connected to A is OK. That way when A is hosed at least the PCs on the LAN can communicate - which is what the OP finally did IIRC.
So connected Port 6 of dlink to port 6 of Dax.
Port 7 of dlink to port 6 of smc. Port 7 of dax to port 7 of smc
It seems that the way you have connected the switches, you are creating a loop, which can result in "broadcast storms" / packets looping around forever.
Search for info on spanning tree protocol, and see if this is part of your problem.
Regards Shahed,
--- "Arun K. Khan" knura@yahoo.com wrote:
On Mon, 2006-02-27 at 23:50 +0530, Dinesh Joshi wrote:
I think the OPs terminology is a bit confusing as well. Is he using switches? What kind of switches is he using? or is he using
routers?
again what kind? whats the model no? and why is he required to frequently reboot them?
Agree with your last question about rebooting the router - why?
To answer your questions. When I said, switches I meant switches. The standard 8 port ones from Dlink/SMC which come for 1050-1800 Rs.
Router is a 802.11b Wireless ADSL Router with 3 port switch built in.
Why Rebooting: I have used 3-4 wireless adsl routers in the past 4-5 years from various companies and have observed that from time to time my connectivity is lost. (both wireless and wired). This is resolved by restarting the router. Not an exact science, but the routers I have seen are more prone to breakdowns than the switches and therefore the need to redundancy. Since earlier, the 3 switches were talking to each other via the router, a failure in the router would mean LAN down too till someone powers down the router and powers it up again.
Maybe it's a firmware problem or maybe I was plain unlucky with the pieces I had. But thats what it was.
Abhi
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On Tuesday 28 February 2006 8:35 am, Abhishek Daga wrote:
To answer your questions. When I said, switches I meant switches. The standard 8 port ones from Dlink/SMC which come for 1050-1800 Rs.
These "switches" are not managed switches which is what the pro means when he says switches. They are souped up hubs.
Router is a 802.11b Wireless ADSL Router with 3 port switch built in.
again is the "switch" here a hub?. If it is a switch u would have three additional ip addresses - one for each i/o. If u really want some fancy control connect your hub/switch and router to four ethernet cards in a debian box and use the box to do all sorts of fancy filtering and bw managment. U could wire up ro reboot the 802.11 router to reboot automagically.
--- JTD jtd@mtnl.net.in wrote:
These "switches" are not managed switches which is what the pro means when he says switches. They are souped up hubs. Router is a 802.11b Wireless ADSL Router with 3 port switch built
in.
again is the "switch" here a hub?. If it is a switch u would have three additional ip addresses - one for each i/o. If u really want some fancy control connect your hub/switch and router to four ethernet cards in a debian box and use the box to do all sorts of fancy filtering and bw managment.
At the risk of sounding kindergarten, I'll admit that I did not know about those switches being souped up hubs. I have learnt a new thing today. To answer your question about the IP addresses. No. there are no IP addresses. The router has 2 ip addresses (LAN/WAN).
But the boxes say Switch. Surely Dlink/DAX know that they are selling?? Or maybe I did not read the fine print.
thanks again.
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On Tuesday 28 February 2006 12:01 pm, Abhishek Daga wrote:
--- JTD jtd@mtnl.net.in wrote:
These "switches" are not managed switches which is what the pro means when he says switches. They are souped up hubs. Router is a 802.11b Wireless ADSL Router with 3 port switch built
in.
again is the "switch" here a hub?. If it is a switch u would have three additional ip addresses - one for each i/o. If u really want some fancy control connect your hub/switch and router to four ethernet cards in a debian box and use the box to do all sorts of fancy filtering and bw managment.
At the risk of sounding kindergarten, I'll admit that I did not know about those switches being souped up hubs. I have learnt a new thing today. To answer your question about the IP addresses. No. there are no IP addresses. The router has 2 ip addresses (LAN/WAN).
so that is just another souped up hub.
But the boxes say Switch. Surely Dlink/DAX know that they are selling?? Or maybe I did not read the fine print.
Welcome to the world of network double speak. They do but would not want you to know. The fine print is just below unreadable (never published). if u connect two such "switches" via the uplink port packet transfer from from one to the other is minimised. But on the ports of each switch everbody essentially receives everbody else's packets. Run ethereal and see.
JTD wrote:
so that is just another souped up hub.
What is this one below?
http://www.dlink.com/products/resource.asp?pid=70&rid=328&sec=0
Regards,
Rony.
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On Tuesday 28 February 2006 5:33 pm, Rony Bill wrote:
JTD wrote:
so that is just another souped up hub.
What is this one below?
http://www.dlink.com/products/resource.asp?pid=70&rid=328&sec=0
No idea abt this one.
On Mon, 2006-02-27 at 23:01 +0530, Arun K. Khan wrote:
On Sun, 2006-02-26 at 09:19 -0800, Abhishek Daga wrote:
Hi folks, I did attempt a google for this but did not know what search term would actually pull up a meaningful result for this.
I tried http://www.google.co.in/search?hl=en&q=ethernet%2Bstandards to read up on the basics.
Searching for "ethernet+topology" came across the following that might help the OP with valid topologies.
http://fcit.usf.edu/network/chap5/chap5.htm
On Sunday 26 February 2006 17:19, Abhishek Daga wrote:
Apparatus/Equipment. a) SMC wireless dsl router (3 port) b) three 8 port switches, (dlink, dax, smc)
Setup: 4 ports in each are used to connect to various PCs. 1 port used up to connect to the wireless router.
Problem: I have had issues with routers where frequent reseting is required. So to prevent the entire internal network going down because of a bad router, I decided to make the connections redundant.
So connected Port 6 of dlink to port 6 of Dax. Port 7 of dlink to port 6 of smc. Port 7 of dax to port 7 of smc with the assumption that even if the router fails, i'l have uninterrupted access.
But this was not to be. Things got messed up, despite enabled connections, machines would not ping each other or the router.
Then finally removed the links from Switch 1 and 2 to the router and also the connection from dax to smc and it started working fine.
So what got messed up in the above setup? I am thinking its something to do with conflicts but not convinced as to why there would be a conflict?
Sorry but i fail to see the redundancy of the above setup. If I understand correctly, then each of the 3 routers are connected to 4 different PCs. So if one fails then some of the PCs will be able to talk to each other. The ones connected to the failed router would be out of the network for good.
--- Dinesh Joshi dinesh.a.joshi@gmail.com wrote:
Setup: 4 ports in each are used to connect to various PCs. 1 port used up to connect to the wireless router.
So connected Port 6 of dlink to port 6 of Dax. Port 7 of dlink to port 6 of smc. Port 7 of dax to port 7 of smc
Sorry but i fail to see the redundancy of the above setup. If I understand correctly, then each of the 3 routers are connected to 4 different PCs. So if one fails then some of the PCs will be able to talk to each other. The ones connected to the failed router would be out of the network for good.
You are right, in that those PCs connected to the particular switch would go offline.
I should have said, that atleast 66% of the network would be up still. But what rony mentioned, looks interesting.. I'll do some research on that.
thanks abhi
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On 26/02/06 09:19 -0800, Abhishek Daga wrote:
<snip>
Problem: I have had issues with routers where frequent reseting is required. So to prevent the entire internal network going down because of a bad router, I decided to make the connections redundant.
So connected Port 6 of dlink to port 6 of Dax. Port 7 of dlink to port 6 of smc. Port 7 of dax to port 7 of smc with the assumption that even if the router fails, i'l have uninterrupted access.
But this was not to be. Things got messed up, despite enabled connections, machines would not ping each other or the router.
Google: Spanning Tree. Homework: State with reasons why the original configuration fails.
Devdas Bhagat
--- Devdas Bhagat devdas@dvb.homelinux.org wrote:
Google: Spanning Tree. Homework: State with reasons why the original configuration fails.
Answer: Spanning-Tree Protocol is a link management protocol that provides path redundancy while preventing undesirable loops in the network. Multiple active paths between stations cause loops in the network. If a loop exists in the network topology, the potential exists for duplication of messages. I had a loop in my original configuration. therefore it failed.
For redundancy the spanning tree protocol forces certain redundant data paths in a standby/blocked state.
i do not think tht with existing equipment and layout i wouldbe able to provide such a redundant network.
thanks.
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Abhishek Daga wrote:
--- Devdas Bhagat devdas@dvb.homelinux.org wrote:
Google: Spanning Tree. Homework: State with reasons why the original configuration fails.
Answer: Spanning-Tree Protocol is a link management protocol that provides path redundancy while preventing undesirable loops in the network. Multiple active paths between stations cause loops in the network. If a loop exists in the network topology, the potential exists for duplication of messages. I had a loop in my original configuration. therefore it failed.
You could use an extra switch and create a sun/star pattern where all the 3 switches connect with a cable each to the fourth new one in the centre. A free port in this new switch could then connect to the router. If router fails then atlest the lan is still up. The advantage of sun pattern should be better bandwidth in comparison with cascading or serial connections.
Regards,
Rony.
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Rony Bill wrote:
You could use an extra switch and create a sun/star pattern where all the 3 switches connect with a cable each to the fourth new one in the centre. A free port in this new switch could then connect to the router. If router fails then atlest the lan is still up. The advantage of sun pattern should be better bandwidth in comparison with cascading or serial connections.
A little more addition. You need not do any new wiring to connect a new switch. Simply replace the router with the switch and place the router adjacent to it. Connect a small lan cable between the switch and the router.
Regards,
Rony.
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