Overview

A FireBrick 2x00 has ethernet 4 ports, typically one port will be for the LAN connection (eg to the main office switch), and the rest for connections to the ADSL modems. As there are 4 ports are we restricted to only bonding up to 3 ADSL/FTTC lines? No.

To overcome the physical port restriction a VLAN switch can be used, eg:

ADSL MODEM 1  --                                           
ADSL MODEM 2  --                                           
ADSL MODEM 3  --  VLAN Switch  --  Firebrick  --  LAN SWITCH  ==  Computers
ADSL MODEM 4  --

The switch would be set up for 4 (or more) separate VLANs on the appropriate ports, and on the FireBrick, the <ppp .../> config would have VLAN="n".

VLAN Switch Config

Here are some notes on setting up a HP ProCurve? 1810G-8

The HP ProCurve 1810G-8 (J9449A) is a nice little 8 port managed switch. No fans and similar in size to a 2700.

Overview

The FireBrick will have a single WAN port, which will plug in to the HP Switch. The ADSL modems will plug in to the HP Switch too. This will then, with VLANs, enable the 2700 to use up to 7 ADSL modems.

Default IP = 192.168.2.10
Default password = blank

Save Config

To make things a little easier, here is a saved config: File:FBVLANconfig1810G.bin.zip. It is the default config (default IP and password), but with VLANs as follows:

Port 1 - VLAN 101, for ADSL line 1
Port 2 - VLAN 101, for ADSL line 2
Port 3 - VLAN 101, for ADSL line 3
Port 4 - VLAN 101, for ADSL line 4
Ports 8 is for the FireBrick

The config was from HP ProCurve 1810G - 8 GE, P.1.17, eCos-2.0, Software Version, P.1.17

However it only takes a few minutes to set up the VLANs manually as follows:

Basic Settings

Set your computer to an IP in the same subnet as the switch, eg 192.168.2.11
Plug computer in to a port, eg port 7
log in to http://192.168.2.10 with a blank password

Maybe set the System description details
Set Admin Password (Maintenance - Password Manager) then Save and re-login.
Enable HTTPS (Security - Secure Connection) generate certificate and apply

Create VLANs.

We will set ports 1-4 to be vlans 101, 102, 103 104. We'll port 8 for plugging in to the FireBrick, and port 7 for our admin.

Create 4 VLANs (VLANS - VLAN Configuration)
Set the names to be ADSL1, ADSL2, ADSL3, ADSL4 - this will match the login/line numbers of the ADSL lines.

Configure ports for VLAN tagging:

Under VLANs - Participation Tagging,:
- set VLAN 101 to be U on port 1 and T on port 8. E on rest
- set VLAN 102 to be U on port 2 and T on port 8. E on rest
- set VLAN 103 to be U on port 3 and T on port 8. E on rest
- set VLAN 104 to be U on port 4 and T on port 8. E on rest

- set VLAN 1 to be E on port 1, 2, 3, 4 and U on port 5, 6, 7, 8

SAVE CONFIG - otherwise you will learn the hard way

IP Address

In order to access the Switch, we'll need to setup a interface on the FB2700 with a subnet in the same range as the switch. We can use the default 192.168.2.0/24, and this will be accessible from the LAN side. Alternately, we can use a public /30. This will involve a new /30 allocation on Clueless, routed to all the ADSL lines, and on the FB2700 a subnet on the WAN interface. Set the gateway to the FireBrick, then the switch can access things like time server, syslog server etc...