connecting routers up to a switch

Mar 12, 2006 1 Replies
Q

I know that usually people connect comps to switches and switches to routers.



But what's the harm in connecting routers to switches? e.g. 3 routers up to 1 switch



I see the prob with connecting switches to switches (too many MACs stored). But routers to a switch, I don't see a prob., yet ppl don't do it.



I see a possible reason. ppl connect routers to routers, but if a router lacks interfaces, e.g. the routers only have 2 interfaces. Then on one interface is the subnetwork, the other remaining interface could be connected to a switch. So a switch could connect a bunch of routers together, each router, with a subnetwork connected to it.



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B

There is no harm in connecting multiple routers to a single switch.

There's also no harm with switches to switches. It's done out of necessity. If you need to increase port density to a floor the easiest thing to do is to attach another switch. We have at least 30 instances where switches are stacked. Some up to four deep. A typical access switch supports storing over ten thousand mac addresses.

You can create many subnets using a router that has a single interface connected to a switch. One option is to set up a trunk between it and the switch using sub-interfaces. I currently have a router with 12 sub-interfaces with each subnet trunked to a 48-port switch across the single link..

BernieM

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