THE REMIT
Winchmore school contacted Performance Networks complaining of serious network issues.
The school was shut down for 2 days before we were onsite as none of the network was usable due to the issues.
The network consisted mainly of Netgear switches & a Cisco Firewall.
THE PROCESS
We initially spent the first day onsite logically mapping the network layout. Although some of this had to be done physically due to a few devices that were “unmanaged” or not configured correctly & so couldn’t really be seen on the network properly.
Once the network was fully mapped, it turned out there were two switches that were causing loops. This meant no IP traffic was getting to where it should.
THE RESULTS
The two switches at fault we removed initially then configured correctly using the preferred Spanning tree protocol (STP). This was also configured correctly & uniformly of all the other switches present. The correct STP root was also setup, as this was incorrectly set.
A full Visio Network diagram & explanation was provided to the school along with a further list of recommendations to improve the Network performance & security.
David Ballard
Director at Performance Networks