Basic Concept of VLAN
VLAN(Virtual Local Area Network)What is this
VLAN ? Why we are using VLAN? How to configure VLAN? all is explained here
What is this VLAN ?
Why we are using
VLAN?
How to decide VLAN?
These are the question
in my mind making storm… But when I took admission in RST forum. Vagish Sir
cleared my all doubts about VLAN. So in this blog we will just focus on the
“VLAN”
So 1st question comes to your mind that why VLAN???
As consider a company
like Accenture or Cisco in which there are 10000 of PC`s and they are
connected on a network and all are in same subnet. The windows operating
system is working on each computer. So as the windows operating system is
always broadcasting its every service and any new service. So if we consider
that our all PC`s are in a same subnet so the every PC will sends its service
broadcast and when it is coming towards a switch it will broadcast it we can`t
use router as all PC`s are in a same subnet. Switch will divide only the
collision domain and not the broadcast domain so switch will make a multiple
copies of that and send to its every port and so if 1 switch has 24 ports then
the 10000/24 equal to a approximately 400 switches are there in a network. Lets
imagine that for every broadcast the switch will make multiple copies and send
its to every port and so it creates very high no of frames flowing through the
network and so if now any PC want to use network then the network is already
having very large traffic.so such a high no. of frames present in a network
causes :-
·
Degradation
of switch performnce
·
Degradation
of PC`s performance
·
Degradation
of useful Bandwidth of a link
so basically
VLAN`s ARE USED TO CONTROL THE BROADCAST DOMAIN.
As so we divide the
network in vlan, each vlan is having different subnet so for the communication
between VLAN we use layer 3 switch or router.
We are doing VLAN
configuration on a switch means what we are doing?
When we define a VLAN
on a switch at that time we are actually dividing the switch in to the smaller
swich virtually where these virtual switchs are working in the different
network (subnet).
From the following
diagram you will get the concept …..
As we made VLAN`s so now each VLAN have its
separate subnet so according to our basic principle the traffic between two
subnet will route and traffic within a subnet will switch. A router or a layer
3 switch is necessary for communication between two VLAN`s.
How to decide that our which PC`s will be in one VLAN and
which will be in the separate VLAN ???
These is decided
on the 80-20% rule .
This rule says that
80% traffic in a network should switch and 20% traffic should route.
As in a organization
people which are in a same department talks more to each other and communicate
more where as the people from different department will talk less to each other
and communicate less to each other.
As we know switching
is faster than routing. so the traffic within a department has to switch (as
more traffic is there) and between the department should route (as less traffic
is there).
So lets take a example
that there is one company like cisco, in this company we have 4 different
departments like engineering, Finance, Human resource and testing so as per our
discussion we will keep the people from 1 department in a same VLAN so when
they communicate then the traffic between them will switch but when communicate
with other department (as they communicate with other department rarely ) so
the traffic will route
Advantages of VLAN :-
·
To
controls the broadcast domain
·
Use
to provide security (it is actually a byproduct)
To provide security
means not like the people from different can’t talk the can talk but their call
or data will routed through a router so with the help of access list and some
other way we can provide them the security. Some people think this is the main
requirement of creating a VLAN but actually it is just a byproduct.(providing
security to one department from other department doesn`t mean that they should
not communicate to each other otherwise in above Cisco company example if a
engineering dept. person can`t talk to testing dept. people then what is the
use of the network)
All this is a basics of VLAN and after this we will see how the
VLAN is configure on a cisco switch and can be extended on more than 1 switch
in my next blog.If you have any doubt about VLAN you can ask it to me by
comment. I will shortly publish my Blog on VLAN trunk port concept and VLAN
Trunking Protocol (VTP). Thanks for reading.
The following Diagram is added for the comment from himanshu to explain how
broadcasting work in Switches on which VLAN is configured.
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