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Forum Discussion
sjd101
Nov 11, 2020Follower
Nest Wifi VLAN Connection issues
Apologies for the long first post but I have fallen down a rabbit hole and started something I wish I hadn't. Been having issues with Nest Wifi dropping. Contacted Google Support who said it was...
sjd201
Nov 12, 2020Aspirant
Firstly, this is sjd101. I have lost access to that account. I am having a nightmare with Netgear Insight as everything is connected and I didnt realise I already had an account. Now I just cannot access it despite resetting password so have had to open a new account just to reply.
Thank you for the really detailed response. I am grateful to you for taking the time to reply. Difficulty with what I am faced with is having 3 different companies to deal with. Ultimately assistance I am looking for here is with settings on the switch but there is obviously some crossover. I will try and respond in order of your response:
1. Got BT Broadband FTTC. Did have a Home BT Hub but bought a Business Hub as this was one of fixes Google suggested having ability to put Router/Modem in bridge mode.
2. Wifi ultimately works and is stable on Home Hub or Business hub on its own. Bought Nest to have a mesh network and improve network in the house (wish I had never bothered!). When you introduce Nest and connect to this network devices do not stay connected. Regularly get message Connected without internet. Spoke to Google Support and was directed to this link
https://support.google.com/googlenest/answer/9798157?hl=en
This is where my problems started. I was originally connected directly to Hub but Google suggested a managed switch so that is where I am up to. Was also told BT use VLAN tagging which Nest does not support hence needing a switch with VLAN features. So connected Nest to new GS324T switch
3. I agree from what I have read re Double NAT
4. Again I agree. Other than being able to implement Bridge mode which Home version cannot do all I have done is satisfy one od the criteria from Google support
5. So set up now :
I am with BT Home Broadband with a master socket accrding to your link. I have spoken to them about VLAN ID today but they said i had to identify it via my PC by going into network settings and apparently it was in properties oon Network Interface Card. I could not find the info. I did find the following on the BT community so would assume that this is correct but not had clarification.
VLAN: 101
VPI: 1
VCI: 32
BT Business Hub in bridge mode and plugged into Port 1 of switch.
Nest WiFi wan into switch port 3
Google support can see my network (which is a bit disconcerting) and they have confirmed VLAN tagging. From research the last piece of the puzzle is the set up on the switch. I believe thgis is the page i need to do the set up
https://kb.netgear.com/31026/How-to-configure-a-VLAN-on-a-NETGEAR-managed-switch
But I have no idea what to do. My BT modem is in Port 1 and Nest WAN goes in to Port 3 but would appreciate some guidance on how this should be set up in order the Nest can deal with VLAN tagging. Its not understanding what I am trying to achieve other than Google support who have said they can still see it and to solve issue they need not to see it. They said IP should end 1 or 254. Nothing else. Apologies for laymen explanation
Hope you can assist with set up and again thanks for taking your time with this
Simon
schumaku
Nov 12, 2020Guru - Experienced User
sjd201 wrote:Firstly, this is sjd101. I have lost access to that account. I am having a nightmare with Netgear Insight as everything is connected and I didnt realise I already had an account.
Hi Simon,
Netgear does just use a SSO system for all applications, for Insight, for Support / MyNetgear ... one identity should be enough.
sjd201 wrote:1. Got BT Broadband FTTC. Did have a Home BT Hub but bought a Business Hub as this was one of fixes Google suggested having ability to put Router/Modem in bridge mode.
I am with BT Home Broadband with a master socket accrding to your link. I have spoken to them about VLAN ID today but they said i had to identify it via my PC by going into network settings and apparently it was in properties oon Network Interface Card. I could not find the info. I did find the following on the BT community so would assume that this is correct but not had clarification.
VLAN: 101
VPI: 1
VCI: 32
FTTC is fiber to the curb, from there it's VDSL or VDSL2 on two wires. The VPI and VCI parameters are for ATM (as used before on ADSL for PPPoA and PPPoE), FTTC uses PTM so nothing to care about.
You can't connect this to a whatever Ethernet port on the switch. The set-up is similar to an earlier ADSL connection (the BT Hub and Business Hub can do this, too), VDSL does just allow much more speed on the shorter telephone cables - which end on some BT equipment on thier fiber box.
The Business Hub does act as a VDSL modem, and does handle the VLAN tagging on the Internet side. This device is certainly up2speed for the usage on the BT network.
Replacing this would require yet anther VDSL/VDSL2 capable modem ... but as I said above, this can't make much sense.
sjd201 wrote:BT Business Hub in bridge mode and plugged into Port 1 of switch.
Nest WiFi wan into switch port 3
And here again, in my understanding the BT Business Hub does already handle the VLAN thing - in bridge mode it is intended to connect a customer supplied router without any VLAN config - all the router has to do is establish a PPPoE session with these standard logins as published: bthomehub@btbroadband.com as the username and left the password field blank.
Does the Nest WiFi have a config option for MTU? It should ... lower it from 1500 to 1492 (8 bytes are used for the PPPoE overhead).
There are many examples showing this is the way to go on the FTTC connections...
sjd201 wrote:2. Wifi ultimately works and is stable on Home Hub or Business hub on its own. Bought Nest to have a mesh network and improve network in the house (wish I had never bothered!). When you introduce Nest and connect to this network devices do not stay connected. Regularly get message Connected without internet.
BT Business Hub in bridge mode and plugged into Port 1 of switch.
Nest WiFi wan into switch port 3
Almost convinced you don't need the switch to convert from a tagged VLAN 101 to an access port on VLAN 101/PVID 101.
- sjd201Nov 12, 2020Aspirant
Hi
Had issues as someone else set up origianal account for some access points at work and I didnt realise I was only a user rather than admin. All went awry when he tried to transfer it. Got a support ticket in so hopefully they can fix it.
So I have read your respose and understand it. The Google support page indicates that you have to plug the nest into the WAN port of the switch but as I see it all the ports are the same. Is that right? Or can you configure one of the ports to act as a WAN?
I have been onto Google support again and they said should only have Nest WAN plugged into switch. This works for WiFi but devices plugged into switch have no internet so thats an issue. Resolved that by plugging Nest WAN into modem and LAN into switch.
So would you just plug the Nest router directly into the BT Hub via Wan and plug LAN from Nest into the switch as I described above? PPPoE info is in the Nest device as you described other than password field which is BT not blank.
I cannot find anything in the config for MTU. Did some google research and it does not appear to be an option.
Dont understand your last comment other than you think managed switch is not necessary with any VLAN settings?
- schumakuNov 13, 2020Guru - Experienced User
sjd201 wrote:Had issues as someone else set up origianal account for some access points at work and I didnt realise I was only a user rather than admin. All went awry when he tried to transfer it. Got a support ticket in so hopefully they can fix it.
Is this on a Basic or Premium Insight subscription? Then only one account exists. All devices should be registered to the same account to keep things simple, e.g. for taking to support or claim hardware warranty.
If this is an Insight Pro environment, there is a more complex roles concept starting with the Pro Admin (a single technical role, held e.g. by your Insight supplier or installer, we use e.g. insightpro@supplier.abc), an Insight Organisation Owner (as there can be many organizations managed, also a technical role, like CIO@customer.xyz), multiple Insight Manager (personal roles, like yourname@customer.xyz and/or a shared role for the supplier like support@supplier.abc). All technical roles should point to email aliases and distribution lists - never to a single personal account. Trouble is that most businesses don't have any working policies on IT processes...so this is where problems are caused when people are doing any kind of registrations for a multi-user-business on personal business accounts or worse private accounts.
It's technically possible to include Insight devices registered to another owner account into the Insight environment, unless these are already insight managed under that other account.
That's enough on Insight excursions for now - convinced Netgear is able to assist for merging accounts or transferring ownerships to the same organisation.
sjd201 wrote:So I have read your respose and understand it. The Google support page indicates that you have to plug the nest into the WAN port of the switch but as I see it all the ports are the same. Is that right? Or can you configure one of the ports to act as a WAN?
Whatever you have read here. Depending on a switch config, a port could have some role based on the switch VLAN/port/routing/whatever config. Per se, a switch does not have a WAN port.
sjd201 wrote:I have been onto Google support again and they said should only have Nest WAN plugged into switch. This works for WiFi ...
So this is just:
BT Business Hub (bridge mode) <-> Switch <-> Nest Router WAN <-> WiFi
Great, so your Nest router and WiFi system does work to this point as expected, isn't it?
So it's time to streamline things:
Confirm at this point there is no VLAN configuration for VLAN 110 with a dedicated port [T]agged to VLAN 110 (no other VLAN), and a dedicated [U]ntagged port for VLAN 110/PIVD 110 ... that's what users with direct Fiber/Ethernet connections have to do to connect any user-supplied router. You don't have to do this at all: The BT Business Hub does handle the BT Internet VLAN part for you also in Bridge mode.
Reduce your set-up by removing the switch from the Internet-side of things:
BT Business Hub <-> Nest Router WAN <-> WiFi
I'm convinced your WiFi will continue to work as expected.
sjd201 wrote:... but devices plugged into switch have no internet so thats an issue. Resolved that by plugging Nest WAN into modem and LAN into switch.
Here I begin to understand where your network issues are coming from. Why on earth is the idea coming from connecting different networks onto one (I assume non-configured!) switch, which out of the box has a plain L2 switch functionality?
If you would like to have TWO networks on your switch - these are the BT-side Internet and your LAN - the switch must be configured accordingly for handling two networks as indicated above, into two VLANs: Two ports for the WAN/Internet, one tagged, one untagged; and all others for your LAN.
But here again, I'm convinced this isn't required at all - because WiFi will run well (as long as you don't connect the BT Internet network and the LAN onto the same plain L2 switch....).
Connect your switch only to the router LAN port as it is. And it will serve you well....
And nothng else must be ever connected to that BT Hub...
sjd201 wrote:So would you just plug the Nest router directly into the BT Hub via Wan and plug LAN from Nest into the switch as I described above? PPPoE info is in the Nest device as you described other than password field which is BT not blank.
Yes, as explained several times now.
sjd201 wrote:I cannot find anything in the config for MTU. Did some google research and it does not appear to be an option.
Oh well, can't find anything, too - guess Google Nest WiFi does derive some MTU based on the connection type and/or testing.
sjd201 wrote:Dont understand your last comment other than you think managed switch is not necessary with any VLAN settings?
Re-read this post from the top again.
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