Multicasting across VLANs

[Devinder Sharma]

Hi All,

I am trying to test multicast streaming across the VLANs and am running into issues. Within VLAN, of course all works fine.

I have configured following on a 3550 Catalyst switch running EMI code. And since I intend to test with couple of other switches and routers, I am setting up this switch as RP ( static).

ip routing

ip multicast-routing

int vlan 2

ip add 192.168.2.1 255.255.255.0

ip pim sparse-mode

int vlan 3

ip add 192.168.3.1 255.255.255.0

ip pim sparse-mode

ip pim rp-address 192.168.2.1

int fa0/1

description "Multicast Source"

sw mode access

sw access vlan 2

int fa0/5

desciption "Multicast Receiver"

sw mode access

sw access vlan 3

I am using VLC player set up as muticast source (UDP with group address of 239.168.2.1 at default port of 1234) on a Vista machine on vlan 2 and on XP machine, a VLC player as streaming client to subscribe to this mulicast on vlan 3. I cannot get this stream on client.

Please advise if I am missing anything in configuration.

Appreciate any help.

Thanks

Devinder Sharma

[Devinder Sharma]

I had my machines running Vista, logged in as administrator and never tested with Windows 7.

Did you make sure that, as such the two machines are talking to each other? One reason it will complain that it cannot bind to the multicast address, will be if the interface is not enabled / or associated in case of wireless.

You should also try using the windows XP/Vista machines if available. Also try changing the multicast address, just to make sure that windows 7 is not accepting this address as valid multicast and hence may not be sending out igmp join message. Try using something like 239.100.1.1, althought the whole 239/8 block is recommneded local administred multicast range, but you never know and the address I had used in my example may be conflicting with some multimedia address used by Windows 7.

Remember, client is acting as server (listening for multicast streams to be received) and server is acting as client.

Devinder Sharma

[IM-Design]

Seems that the problem with iPerf is related to version 2.0.2. I found version 1.7 and your configuration worked for me.

So, next step for me was to test multicating between these 2 vlans using vlc

In doing so I followed the thread, but was not able to see (or hear) the streaming content and the client end

On the server on vlan1 at 192.168.5.27 , this was my vlc command

vlc -vvv Gravity.flac --sout udp:239.255.1.1--ttl 12

On the client on vlan25 at 192.168.25.193, this is what I tried:

vlc rtp://@239.255.1.1

Im not getting anything on the client, but I can use vlc to play the file locally on the server.

TIA

[Devinder Sharma]

I have iPerf 2.02 for long time. An I had used VLC GUI, so not sure if there is any command syntax isssue with your situation.

For multicasting on a single switch, even without any multicasting config, it shoudl work, as it simply become brodcast. And you just need igmp snooping on the single L2 switch.

Switch config is really simple and I am sure you have followed my example. Then it has to be something with VLC set up. Try using wireshark to see what is the actual TTL.