M4300 - Voice VLAN vs. Auto-Voip - understanding configuration - seems not to work
Good Morning,
sorry my english is probably not the best.
I have few M4300 Switches in a stack. My ip-phones shoud automatically be a member in a vlan. At the moment we still use a stack of Netgear GS748TPS. The M4300s don't seem to be able to voice vlan the way the old GS748TPS did.
Old way (GS748TPS)
1. Add a vlan
2. Add OUI
3. Set the Voice VLAN Mode to "auto"
That's all. After i connect a ip-phone, the switch join the port automaticaly to configured VLAN as a tagged port. This has worked stably for many years. In this scenario the ip-phone have fix ip-address, vlan and the packes where tagged by the phone. No DHCP oder LLDP ist neccessary.
New way with M4300, seems not to work?
1. Add a vlan
2. Add OUI and set a vlan in Auto-Voip menu item
3. Enable Auto-Voip on all Ports (except Stacking Ports or VLAN trunk ports)
Now the switch put all the ports into the vlan as untagged ports, no matter if a phone is connected or not. This can not work, because the phone has an integrated switch. The packets to the phone must be tagged.
Re: M4300 - Voice VLAN vs. Auto-Voip - understanding configuration - seems not to work
Hello,
the guide (Auto-Voip and LLDP-MED-Guide) seems not fully correct. As soon as voice vlan is enabled and a port is set to Interface Mode VLAN ID, the port is a tagged member of the entered vlan. A connected Phone works. But in VLAN Membership you can not see it. Why do i need the other steps from the guide?
What is best practice for configuring vlan for ip-phones?
Is there somewhere a detailed description what Auto-Voip and Voice VLAN do?
Both Auto-VOIP and Voice VLAN has it benefits and has the same function, to prioritize/identify Voice traffic. You may want to check this article that discusses the two functions/features.
The following links from NETGEAR also contains information:
That's exactly how I would like it. But the M4300s don't work that way. The OUI from the Auto-Voip menu item is independend from the Voice VLAN.
Also in the FS Community link.
OUI Information Setting When packets reach the port which is enabled Voice VLAN, the switch will detect if the traffic is voice traffic according to its OUI information. But the Auto VoIP feature doesn’t need to set OUI information of the IP Phones because it doesn’t identify the voice traffic by reading its OUI information.
This is not how it works with the M4300. The OUI does not belong to the Voice VLAN. It belongs to Auto-Voip.
Voice VLAN on the M4300 (it looks like this)
- Add VLAN
- Enable Voice VLAN Mode on Port -> VLAN ID 10
Now the switch tells the phone through LLDP-MED to use VLAN 10 (for example). Now the port is a member of vlan 10 (seems so). But in the vlan member list this is not displayed. If i disable LLDP-MED on the phone and configure the vlan settings manually, the phone does not work. It works only the M4300 can exchange LLDP-MED packets with the connected phone.
From the M4300 manual
A voice VLAN configures the ingress port as tagged (in VLAN-ID mode) only if the switch can exchange LLDP-MED packets with the VoIP device. If the VoIP device is not LLDP-capable or LLDP is disabled on the switch port, the voice VLAN does not add the VLAN as tagged or untagged on the ingress port. That is, the voice VLAN does not really work if the LLDP-MED exchange does not occur.
It does not work as described in the link (FS). There is no identification based on a configured VLAN ID from the phone. In Voice VLAN the M4300 sends LLDP-MED Message to every connected device. Theres no identification by the OUI.
If i enable Auto-Voip, the switch put all the enabled ports (no matter if a phone is connected or not) as a untagged member to the associated vlan. Pointless, if the phone have a built in switch.
Now we have found out what all does not work. But there must be a preconceived logic from netgear how this has to work. The Smart Switches are straightforward. Add VLAN, OUI, priority, connect phone and it works. The M4300 are broken there.
I am now left clueless and regret having bought 10 M4300 switches. Presales support has confirmed that it all works.
