Router Support for VLANs

[Mark Luther]

I recently bought an 851 only to find out afterwards that it only supports 1 VLAN when I needed it to support at least 7. The documentation on VLAN support seemed pretty buried.

Does anyone know if there is an easy way to find out how many VLANs each router model supports? I dont' want to make the same mistake again, and I can't seem to find what I'm looking for by combing through the data sheets for each model.

Thanks!

[Collin Clark]

Mark-

It sounds like you should look into a layer 3 switch. It can route numerous VLANs (restricted my processor/memory) and it will be more efficient at routing. A 3560 will easily support 7+ VLANs.

HTH

[Mark Luther]

Excellent, thank you! Do you think this would be better than a router-on-a-stick solution?

If so, do you know if I'll need anything like advanced IP services to support the L3 functionality, or will it work with a base IP image?

Thanks again!!

[royalblues]

You should be good with the IPbase image for routing between the vlans

The only difference with the IPbase image is that you cannot run routing prootocols like OSPF and BGP for which you require IP services image and is limited to static & EIGRP stub

HTH

Narayan

[glen.grant]

Ip services support advanced routing protocols like bgp or ospf or EIGRP . Think base supports basic ip routing , rip and eigrp stub routing . Really depends on what you need it to do . A layer 3 switch will certainly be faster but then again more expensive.