I have 3 stacked GSM7352S switches. Switch A is connected to B which is connected to C which is connected back to A. I suspect the answer is yes, but I am concerned that STP might be creating problems with my Xserves running Mac OS X Server 10.6.8? Any opinions?
Are you only running the one stack of switches or do you have other switches in the network? Do you have any VLAN separation on your network?
The loop that you set with your stack is communicating with the stack protocol and does not show as a loop in your network. If you had other switches that were in the network can have a chance of looping.
There are different types of STP that are handled a little differently. (eg. RSTP) I would check to see if the OSX server will be able to hand the other STP protocols the switch supports.
We have the 1 stack of switch plus we have a small switch connected to a port. And we occasionally add a 2nd small switch to another port. And we have a router connected to a port that takes a small amount of traffic to another private network. I see that the switch is set to RSTP.
I have been told to not worry about our version of Mac OS X Server and STP.
Someone adviced to turn on FastLink on ports on the switch that go directly to endpoints but I cannot find this setting on the GSM7352S. I see an Admin Edge Port setting for each port, which can be set to Enabled or Disabled but shows up as True in the Web interface. I am wondering if I should disable this setting for ports that go to other switches.
The purpose of spanning tree protocol is to allow redundant connections between switches to exist without creating loops that would bring the network down.
If you did not have those switches in a stack, then yes you would need stp, and you would be in no doubt about it, within seconds of you connecting the last link completing the loop (for the sake of discussion the cable between switch A & switch C), you would have had a non-functional network - non functional as in no traffic across the LAN - and all the active ports lights flashing furiously.
If you have stp enabled and you want to know if it's required, remove the A~C link (or any one of the interswitch links), and then disable stp on all switches and then reconnect the cable, the LAN will either stay up or go down - if it goes down, you need it, if it doesn't you don't - if you do, disconnect the link to break the loop and reconfigure.
Someone adviced to turn on FastLink on ports on the switch that go directly to endpoints but I cannot find this setting on the GSM7352S. I see an Admin Edge Port setting for each port, which can be set to Enabled or Disabled but shows up as True in the Web interface. I am wondering if I should disable this setting for ports that go to other switches.
Edge Port is Netgear's naming for "portfast" on products of another well-known network vendor.
Yes "spanning-tree edgeport" should be disabled on ports where you expect to have uplinks. But if you disable STP on Ports where you have enabled edgeport, you can create loops (tested that on my own in a lab)
Also check out how BPDU filter and BPDU guard work, this switch should be similar to what I have here.
