8-2
Catalyst 2900 Series XL and Catalyst 3500 Series XL Software Configuration Guide
78-6511-08
Chapter 8 Configuring VLANs
Overview
Overview
A virtual LAN (VLAN) is a switched network that is logically segmented by function, project team, or
application, without regard to the physical locations of the users. Any switch port can belong to a VLAN,
and unicast, broadcast, and multicast packets are forwarded and flooded only to stations in the VLAN.
Each VLAN is considered a logical network, and packets destined for stations that do not belong to the
VLAN must be forwarded through a router or bridge as shown in
Figure 8-1
. VLANs are identified with
a number of 1 to 1001.
Because a VLAN is considered a separate logical network, it contains its own bridge Management
Information Base (MIB) information and can support its own implementation of the Spanning Tree
Protocol (STP). For information about managing VLAN STP instances, see the
“Supported STP
Instances” section on page 6-33
.
Table 8-1
lists the number of supported VLANs and STP instances on the switches.
Figure 8-1
VLANs as Logically Defined Networks
Table 8-1
Maximum Number of Supported VLANs
Switch
Maximum Number
of VLANs
Maximum Number
of STP Instances
Trunking
Supported?
Catalyst 2912 XL, Catalyst 2924 XL, and
Catalyst 2924C XL switches
64
64
Yes
Catalyst 2900 LRE XL switches
250
64
Yes
Catalyst 2912M and Catalyst 2924M
modular switches
250
64
Yes
Catalyst 3500 XL switches
250
64
Yes
Floor 1
Floor 2
Engineering
VLAN
Cisco router
Fast
Ethernet
Catalyst 2900
series XL
Catalyst 3500
series XL
Floor 3
Marketing
VLAN
Accounting
VLAN
15933
Catalyst 2900
series XL