A Virtual LAN (VLAN) is a group of ports that form a logical ethernet segment on a Layer 2 switch which provides better administration, security, and management of multicast traffic. A VLAN is a network topology configured according to a logical scheme rather than a physical layout. When you use a VLAN, users can be grouped by logical function instead of their physical location. All ports that frequently communicate with each other are assigned to the same VLAN, regardless of where they are physically on the network.

VLANs let you logically segment your network into different broadcast domains so that you can group ports with related functions into their own separate, logical LAN segments on the same switch. This allows broadcast packets to be forwarded only between ports within the VLAN which can prevent broadcast packets from being sent to all the ports on a single switch. A VLAN also increases network performance by limiting broadcasts to a smaller and more manageable logical broadcast domain. VLANs also improve security by limiting traffic to specific broadcast domains.

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To access the VLAN page, follow the steps below:

808.1Q

Each VLAN in a network has an associated VLAN ID, which appears in the IEEE 802.1Q tag in the Layer 2 header of packets transmitted on a VLAN. The IEEE 802.1Q specification establishes a standard method for tagging ethernet frames with VLAN membership information. The key for IEEE 802.1Q to perform its functions is in its tags. Switch ports that are 802.1Q-compliant can be configured to transmit tagged or untagged frames. A tag field containing VLAN information can be inserted into an ethernet frame. When using 802.1Q VLAN configuration, you configure ports to be a part of a VLAN group. When a port receives data tagged for a VLAN group, the data is discarded unless the port is a member of the VLAN group.

• VID: Displays the VLAN ID for which the network policy is defined. The range of the VLAN ID is from 1 to 4094.
• Name: Enter the VLAN name. You can use up to 32 alphanumeric characters.
• Tagged Port: Frames transmitted from this port are tagged with the VLAN ID.
• Untagged Port: Frames transmitted from this port are untagged.
• Add: Click this button to add to the list.
• Edit: Allows you to update or edit the settings.
• Delete: Removes an ID from the list.

The switch's default setting is to assign all ports to a single 802.1Q VLAN (VID 1). Keep this in mind when configuring the VLAN settings for the switch.

PVID

When an untagged packet enters a port, the Port VLAN ID (PVID) will be attached to the untagged packet and the frames will be forwarded to the VLAN-specified VID part of the PVID. A packet received on a given port would be assigned to that port's PVID and then forwarded to the port that corresponded to the packet's destination address. If the PVID of the port that received the packet is different from the PVID of the port that transmitted the packet, the switch will drop the packet. Within the switch, different PVIDs mean different VLANs, so VLAN identification based on the PVIDs cannot create VLANs that extend outside a given switch. If no VLANs are defined on the switch, all ports are then assigned to a default VLAN with a PVID equal to 1.

To enable PVID functionality, the following requirements must be met:

• All ports must have a defined PVID.
• If no other value is specified, the default VLAN PVID is used.
• If you wish to change the port's default PVID, you must first create a VLAN that includes the port as a member.

• Port: Displays the VLAN ID to which the PVID tag is assigned. Configure the PVID to assign untagged or tagged frames received on the selected port.
• PVID: Enter the PVID value. The range is from 1 to 4094.
• Accept Type: Select Tagged Only, Untagged Only, or ALL from the list.
• Tagged Only: The port discards any untagged frames it receives. The port only accepts tagged frames.
• Untagged Only: Only untagged frames received on the port are accepted.
• ALL: The port accepts both tagged and untagged frames.
• Ingress Filtering: Specify how you wish the port to handle tagged frames. Select Enabled or Disabled from the list.
• Enabled: Tagged frames are discarded if VID does not match the PVID of the port.
• Disabled: All frames are forwarded in accordance with the IEEE 802.1Q VLAN.

Voice VLAN

You can configure the Voice VLAN settings of the Linksys Managed Gigabit Switch to enhance your Voice over IP (VoIP). Voice VLAN provides Quality of Service (QoS) to VoIP, ensuring that the quality of the call does not deteriorate if the IP traffic is received erratically or unevenly.