Management VLAN

[tecknology]

By default there are three types of traffic that pass through Catalyst switches:

Control traffic

Management traffic

End-user traffic

Control traffic includes CDP, VTP ,PAgP

Management traffic includes end-to-end and IP-based protocols such as Telnet, SNMP, and VQP (the protocol used by VMPS). These protocols always use the VLAN assign to SC0.

by default all three traffics are assigned to VLAN 1. Can we change a management VLAN to any VLAN ?, if we change a management vlan to another VLAN will control traffic is also changed automatically to the new management vlan or not?

And if we change management vlan to another VLAN and if we assume that even control traffic is changed automatically to new management vlan, will this switch in which management vlan has changed to another VLAN will communicate with control traffic of another switch's control traffic that uses VLAN 1 as management vlan .

[Mark Yeates]

By default all your control traffic will still use VLAN 1 even if you remove or don't use it for management. That's why it is highly recommended to use a different management VLAN.

Control traffic: Will use VLAN 1.

Management traffic: You should create a seperate VLAN (Telnet, SSH, SNMP.. etc) for management only.

End-user traffic: You should create different VLAN's (Not VLAN 1 or management VLAN) for user traffic.

Here are a few links for a better understanding than my explanation.

http://www.cisco.com/warp/public/cc/pd/si/casi/ca6000/prodlit/vlnwp_wp.htm#wp39009

http://www.cisco.com/en/US/products/hw/switches/ps700/products_white_paper09186a00801b49a4.shtml#pre6

HTH,

Mark