I ordered a MS510TXUP to completely replace the Meraki from this setup, the Meraki was really only pulled from storage temporarily to use for POE+ for my AP's while I waited on the MS510TXUP to arrive.
I hung the MS510TXUP (latest FW as of today) off the Meraki to get everything configured correctly, I am using Inisght to manage the switch. I am able to get everything working on the MS510TXUP, I have 3 VLAN's, I'm able to migrate my AP's, NAS, and wired clients to the MS510TXUP so that the only thing hanging off the Meraki switch, is the Netgear switch. Everything works as expected in that setup.
When I try to move the uplink to my router (Pfsense) from the Meraki to the Netgear and remove the Meraki from the equation, I lose all connectivity and cannot get it back, unless I move the uplink back to the Meraki, and then hang the Netgear off the Meraki again. I've tried rebooting Pfsense, Netgear switch, nothing comes back unless I move it all back under the Meraki switch.
My uplink port on the Netgear has all my VLAN's associated, as well as default vlan. I'm thinking its something simple I am missing here, but I can't figure it out. This is the first time I have used a Netgear switch.
Not a lot of informative insight to help - provide what config is expected to be in place on the pfsense (assume LAN port), what you think what is configured by Insight on the MS510TXUP uplink, and how the MS510TXUP access point ports are configured - and last but not least on what is configured on the APs. The crystal ball is currently out of service, and the configuration of the replaced switch ports does remain in the dark - at least to the reader here.
PfSense Lan Port is the uplink in question. The Netgear uplink port 1, is configured the same as the Meraki Uplink port 1, when I move the connection from PfSense Lan between Meraki Port 1, to Netgear port 1 is when I lose connectivity. Ports 2-8 on the Netgear, and configured the same as ports 2-8 were on the Meraki. Ports 2-4 are trunked for my AP's, with the VLAN's for my SSID's on the ports as well. Netgear seems to do this a little differently, on the Meraki I configure the port as Trunk, and set the native VLAN to 1, and I allow all VLANS. On Netgear I do the same except there is no equivalent that I have found to allow all VLANS, so I assign the 2 VLANS for my SSIDs to ports 2-4 as Trunk. Ports 5-8 on both switches are configured as access ports.
One thing I tried today, that seems to work, and I do not really understand why, is I tried this. I had PFsense>Meraki>with Netgear hanging off the Meraki. All good, connectivity is fine. Moved my AP's and everything else from ports 2-8, to the Netgear. Everything still is good. Now I moved the PfSsense LAN connection from the Meraki port 1, to the Netgear port 1, so in essence, the Meraki is now hanging off the Netgear instead of the other way around, and everything still works. 2nd to last step, I disconnected the Meraki completely, and all is still working.
Last step is to reboot it all and see if it still works, ill try that at lunch today.
Pretty sure I figured this out. PfSense is set to give out DNS via DHCP. My DNS server is inside my LAN. So when the MS510TX boots up, it can't get to the DNS server during boot, since the DNS server is on a device connected to itself and the switch hasn't fully loaded. That's my best idea at this point, and if I set the MS510TX to use an external DNS it does work., but that seems like unexpected behavior.
Why would DNS even matter in this case, my understanding of Netgear Insight, or any cloud-managed switch like Meraki, is that if it can't reach the cloud, it will still work with its current config assuming that config is good, which mine is, you just can't change anything. That is the behavior I see with Meraki switches all the time, do Insight configured switches have to have cloud connectivity to even function?
