Joining two separate networks

Street · 1 Jul 2008 at 12:25

One of our clients currently has two separate networks in their office. The have a network for the sales team and a network for the rest of the offices.

The two networks each have their own switch, router and broadband connection. The boss down there originally wanted it set up like this so that the sales guys didn't affect the main network and didn't have access to the server.

Now however, they have moved office and have had a new phone system put in. The network is still set up how it was, but the coms guys have a piece of software that works with the phone. For this to work on all PCs, they all need to be on the same network. Now the boss wants this software to work on them all but wants them on separate networks..

What is the best way to go about doing that?

Is it possible to do some sort of VLAN using one switch and two routers so that the sales PCs can connect to the phone server?

Cheers,
Andy

Rob7865 · 1 Jul 2008 at 12:28

Hi

Best way would be to put a "real" router (not ADSL/Cable modem type) in between the two networks - this will then allow the packets to be routed to the correct network as needed.

Rob

Street · 1 Jul 2008 at 12:33

Some sort of Cisco router? You mean connect the router to the two connections and to the two separate switches?

Gibbs · 1 Jul 2008 at 14:28

stick one of these in the middle:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showp...ame=Netgear FS605 5-Port Fast Ethernet Switch

so you take a cat5 cable from each of your current network routers and wack them into the above unit, networks will be linked and can all talk to each other.

the above unit is a cheap home based one so finding something suitable to your needs would be advised

Trifid · 1 Jul 2008 at 14:32

Gibbs said:
stick one of these in the middle:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showp...ame=Netgear FS605 5-Port Fast Ethernet Switch

That's a switch, a router with 2 fa (or gigabit if required?) wan ports is required to route between networks.

Street, can you provide a budget for the solution?

Street · 1 Jul 2008 at 14:40

I'm not sure on budget so far, I've got to come up with some solutions and then give them some prices..

brendy · 1 Jul 2008 at 14:57

Are they on the same subnet range of ip addresses?
Ie are they both on 192.168.1.xxx or whatever?

Street · 1 Jul 2008 at 15:05

Yeh, they are both on the same range.

SoundsGood · 1 Jul 2008 at 23:34

test

test678

brendy · 1 Jul 2008 at 23:39

A switch and some good old permissions would sort that network out rightly. Assign all users into the usual groups and deny the sales group access to the areas they are not to be allowed into.

Street · 2 Jul 2008 at 10:43

brendy said:
A switch and some good old permissions would sort that network out rightly. Assign all users into the usual groups and deny the sales group access to the areas they are not to be allowed into.

That would be one way as the rest of the office is already on a domain. However, the boss at the company wanted two separate internet connections..

brendy · 2 Jul 2008 at 16:35

Tell him to wise up, have one decent connection out and employ QOS if its apt.

nuttybugger · 2 Jul 2008 at 20:33

put one team in one vlan, the other in another, then put both teams phones in their own voice vlan.

this keeps all the voice communication on one network, and the 2 teams on their own network all while being plugged into the same switches.

does obviously depend on what equipment you are using, if its capable, and if you are able to actually do all the configuration to implement the vlans. Its a little complex if you've never come across it before. Best bet is to lookup configuring vlans on the cisco site. quite a lot of documentation there.

can also set it up so the whole network can load balance between the 2 routers, but thats also quite complicated and i only know how to do it on cisco routers using glbp.

Street · 3 Jul 2008 at 11:22

I've never set up a VLAN before, but I would have thought I would be able to after a bit of reading about..

One of the switches down there is a DLink DES-1250G which does support VLANs. I guess I'll have a play with that and see what I can do. If the two networks are on separate VLANs, will they both still be able to see the phone server?

Could you recommend a decent switch that would be capable of doing this?

nuttybugger · 3 Jul 2008 at 14:25

if you set up intervlan routing and vlan trunking it should... that means the routers will be able to route packets between the networks like they were seperate networks entirely.

as for switches i cant really say...at work we use cisco catalyst 3560's to 3750s but depends on your budget and technical knowledge of how to set them up.

also have to get the correct cisco IOS version(the operating system on the switch) as some dont support vlan trunking.

I would maybe get a consultant to have a look at the situation though, they's be able to recommend a solution a lot better than some bloke on a forum who's not even got a ccna yet!

oddjob62 · 3 Jul 2008 at 14:43

nuttybugger said:
if you set up intervlan routing and vlan trunking it should... that means the routers will be able to route packets between the networks like they were seperate networks entirely.

Obviously you will have to change the one of the networks to another IP range, or none of this will work.