CPE VLAN configuration

RouterOS General
1

Hey all, I recently inherited a pretty good sized middle-mile network with 3 ISPs. The whole mess revolves around a Packetfront ASR and VLAN trunking to the ISPs.

Here’s what appears to be a typical CPE configuration:

  • wlan1 connected to AP
  • vlan1 on wlan
  • ether1 connecting to customer PC/Router
  • Bridge between vlan1 and ether1

I can’t see it, but I assume that there’s a broadband router or some such attached to the ether1 interface that has the assigned IP address from the ISP.

This VLAN configuration doesn’t seem to match up with what I’ve read about configuring VLANs on MT, which described bridging the 2 interfaces, then putting the VLAN on the bridge.

Am I correct in assuming that ALL traffic passing through this unit from the customer, to the ISP, is getting tagged by the router? If not, what’s going on with this configuration?

Thanks!

2

You can attach a vlan to a physical interface (usually as a virtual interface attached to the wlan1). It works fine. I have seen many networks set up this way. They work.

Using bridges allows for much better future proofing and reliability as it is easier to add/remove interfaces to the bridge and not breaking anything. Always a good thing when playing with an AP which is many hundreds of miles from where you are sitting all comfortable, warm and dry! :slight_smile: