TECHNICAL COMMUNICATION

No. TC0623

Ed. 01

OmniPCX Enterprise

Nb of pages : 11

Date : 29 December 2004

URGENT
NOT URGENT

TEMPORARY

PERMANENT

SUBJECT : 802.1P/Q CONFIGURATION GUIDELINES FOR ALCATEL IP PHONES CONNECTED

TO A CISCO CATALYST SWITCH
The intent of this document is to provide guidelines for configuring Alcatel IP Phones, IP Touch and
Cisco Catalyst series switching equipments in a network environment using VLAN facilities.
This document covers Alcatel IP Phones V1S, V2, IP Touch and Cisco Catalyst series 35XX products.

OmniPCX Enterprise
802.1P/Q CONFIGURATION GUIDELINES
FOR ALCATEL IP PHONES CONNECTED TO
A CISCO CATALYST SWITCH

CONTENTS
1.

INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................3

2.

GLOSSARY...................................................................................3

3.

GENERAL RULES ..........................................................................3

3.1.

Rules for 802.1P/Q Tagging ..................................................................... 3

3.1.1.

Tagging rules on Cisco Switch ports..................................................................3

3.1.2. Connecting a single VLAN device (CS,GD, INTIP, LIOE, IP Phone without PC
connected)...........................................................................................................4
3.1.3.

Connecting a multi- VLAN device (IP Phone).....................................................5

3.2.

Spanning Tree Issues ................................................................................ 7

3.3.

Speed/Duplex ........................................................................................... 8

3.4.

Configuration advices if following Cisco features are used ....................... 9

3.5.

Using Alcatel AVA (Automatic VLAN Assignment) feature....................... 10

4.

TOPOLOGY................................................................................10

Ed. 01 / 29 December 2004

TC0623

OmniPCX Enterprise
802.1P/Q CONFIGURATION GUIDELINES
FOR ALCATEL IP PHONES CONNECTED TO
A CISCO CATALYST SWITCH

TC0623

Ed. 01 / 29 December 2004

OmniPCX Enterprise
802.1P/Q CONFIGURATION GUIDELINES
FOR ALCATEL IP PHONES CONNECTED TO
A CISCO CATALYST SWITCH

1.

INTRODUCTION

The intent of this document is to provide guidelines for configuring Alcatel IP Phones, IP Touch and
Cisco Catalyst series switching equipments in a network environment using VLAN facilities.
This document covers Alcatel IP Phones V1S, V2, IP Touch and Cisco Catalyst series 35XX products.

2.

GLOSSARY

VLAN
Virtual Local Area Network A VLAN is a switched network that is logically segmented by function,
project team, or application, without regard to the physical locations of the users.
PVID
Port VLAN identifier.
VVID
Voice VLAN identifier.
WAN
Wide Area Network, corresponds to a network outside the enterprise, and located on a wider
area.

3.

GENERAL RULES

Because of the time-sensitive nature of VoIP applications, VoIP must be implemented on an entirely
switched network. Ethernet collisions a major contributor to delay and jitter are virtually
eliminated on switched networks. Additionally, VoIP endpoints should be placed on separate subnets
or VLANs (separated from other non-VoIP hosts). This provides for a cleaner design where VoIP hosts
are not subjected to broadcasts from other hosts, and where troubleshooting is simplified. This also
provides a routed boundary between the VoIP segments and the rest of the enterprise network,
where restrictions can be placed to prevent unwanted traffic from crossing the boundary.

3.1.
3.1.1.

Rules for 802.1P/Q Tagging

Tagging rules on Cisco Switch ports

Access Ports.
An access port belongs to and carries the traffic of only one VLAN (unless it is configured as a
voice VLAN port). Traffic is received and sent in native formats with no VLAN tagging. Traffic
arriving on an access port is assumed to belong to the VLAN assigned to the port.

If an access port receives a tagged packet (Inter-Switch Link [ISL] or 802.1Q tagged) for the
VLAN assigned to the port, the packet is forwarded.

If the port receives a tagged packet for another VLAN, the packet is dropped, the source
address is not learned, and the frame is counted in the No destination statistic.

Ed. 01 / 29 December 2004

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OmniPCX Enterprise
802.1P/Q CONFIGURATION GUIDELINES
FOR ALCATEL IP PHONES CONNECTED TO
A CISCO CATALYST SWITCH

Trunk Ports.
A trunk port carries the traffic of multiple VLANs and by default is a member of all VLANs in the
VLAN database. Two types of trunk ports are supported:

In an ISL trunk port, all received packets are expected to be encapsulated with an ISL header,
and all transmitted packets are sent with an ISL header. Native (non-tagged) frames received
from an ISL trunk port are dropped.

An IEEE 802.1Q trunk port supports simultaneous tagged and untagged traffic. An 802.1Q
trunk port is assigned a Native trunk VLAN ID, and all untagged traffic travels on the Native
trunk VLAN-ID. All untagged traffic and tagged traffic with a NULL VLAN ID are assumed to
belong to the Native trunk VLAN-ID. A packet with a VLAN ID equal to that Native VLAN-ID
is sent untagged. All other traffic is sent with a VLAN tag.

3.1.2.

Connecting a single VLAN device (CS,GD, INTIP, LIOE, IP Phone without PC

connected)

A single-VLAN device belongs to only one VLAN, thus, there is NO NEED TO TAG TO SPECIFY A
VLAN, the switch port configuration will determine the VLAN.
Configuration

Device(MAO and IP Phone or IP Touch).

Default configuration.

No VLAN configuration necessary on Alcatel single VLAN devices such as CS, GD, INTIP,
LIOE and IP Phones or IP Touch without PC connected.

Switch port.

The connected switch port should be configured in "access mode" belonging to the
designated VLAN
Command

Purpose

configure terminal

Enter global configuration mode

interface interface-id

Enter the interface to be added to the VLAN

switchport mode access

Define the VLAN membership mode for the port (Layer 2

access port)

switchport access vlan VVID

Assign the port to the Voice VLAN-ID. Valid VLAN IDs are 1
to 4094

End

Return to privileged EXEC mode

show running-config interface

interface-id

Verify the VLAN membership mode of the interface

show interfaces interface-id

switchport

Verify your entries in the Administrative Mode and the

Access Mode VLAN fields of the display

copy running-config startup-config

(Optional) Save your entries in the configuration file

TC0623

Ed. 01 / 29 December 2004

OmniPCX Enterprise
802.1P/Q CONFIGURATION GUIDELINES
FOR ALCATEL IP PHONES CONNECTED TO
A CISCO CATALYST SWITCH

3.1.3.

Connecting a multi- VLAN device (IP Phone)

Alcatel IP Phone, IP Touch are multi-VLAN devices thanks to the integrated switch with one free
Ethernet interface. The most common Multi-VLAN scenario is an IP Phone, or IP Touch with a PC
attached, where the phone and PC are on different VLANs. In this case the PC would send clear
frames, forwarded in the "native VLAN" (PVID), and the IP Phone, or IP Touch should tag with the
Voice VLAN-ID (VVID) and desired priority..
Configuration

MAO.

Default configuration.

IP Phone.
The designated VLAN (VVID) must be configured on IP Phone as follows:

Enter the IP Phone configuration menu (while initialize click successively on [i] button and #
button).

Select menu 2 (IP Parameters) then 7 (Default VLAN).

Select 1 (enables the 802.1Q tagging).

Select 2 and enter the Voice VLAN-ID (VVID).

Select 0 and validate the configuration.

IP Touch.
The designated VLAN (VVID) must be configured on IP Touch as follows:

Enter the IP Touch configuration menu (while initialize click successively on [i] button and #
button).

Select SoftKey IP parameters.

Use down navigator to arrive to "VLAN" configuration.

Check CheckBox "Use VLAN".

Enter the appropriate value in InputBox "VLAN-ID" (VVID).

Validate by the top Embedded "Validate" icon.

Select Embedded "Exit" icon to validate the configuration.

Switch port.
Two possible configurations.
1

First possibility is to move the switch port into "Trunk mode" with appropriate parameters as
describe in following table.

Ed. 01 / 29 December 2004

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OmniPCX Enterprise
802.1P/Q CONFIGURATION GUIDELINES
FOR ALCATEL IP PHONES CONNECTED TO
A CISCO CATALYST SWITCH

Command

Purpose

configure terminal

Enter global configuration mode

interface interface-id

Enter the interface to be added to the VLAN

switchport trunk encapsulation

dot1q
switchport mode trunk

Configure the port to support 802.1Q encapsulation

switchport trunk native vlan PVID

Specify the native VLAN to which belongs the attached (PC)

device

switchport
PVID, VVID

trunk

allowed

End

Set the interface in permanent trunking mode

vlan Specify the VLANs traffic allowed over the port (Both Voice
VLAN and Data VLAN)
Return to privileged EXEC mode

show interfaces interface-id

Verify your voice VLAN entries
switchport
copy
running-config
startup- (Optional) Save your entries in the configuration file
config
2

An alternate possibility is use of Cisco "Voice Vlan" feature. The "voice VLAN" feature is a
Cisco specific port configuration for Cisco IP Phones. However as a result of tests an Alcatel
IP Phone may work correctly if connected to such a configured port. The main benefits of
that solution is the easy configuration method, and the port automatically move into
"Portfast" state to avoid spanning tree issues; see section 3.2 .
"Voice VLAN" should be configured on static or dynamic switch access ports.
Command

Purpose

configure terminal

Enter global configuration mode

interface interface-id

Enter the interface to be added to the VLAN

switchport voice vlan VVID

Specify the VLAN to which belongs the IP Phone (the one

configured in the IP Phone)
Utagged traffic will be forwarded to the PVID (The Port VLAN
ID defined in "access vlan")
Return to privileged EXEC mode

End

show interfaces interface-id

Verify your voice VLAN entries
switchport
copy
running-config
startup- (Optional) Save your entries in the configuration file
config

TC0623

Ed. 01 / 29 December 2004

OmniPCX Enterprise
802.1P/Q CONFIGURATION GUIDELINES
FOR ALCATEL IP PHONES CONNECTED TO
A CISCO CATALYST SWITCH

3.2.

Spanning Tree Issues

The following recommendations applies to optimize operation with Alcatel IP Phones or IP Touch and
other endpoints such as CS (Call Server), GD (Gateway Driver), CPU, INTIP and LIOe.
The spanning tree protocol is a layer 2 protocol used to prevent loops when multiple L2 network
devices are connected together. When a device is first connected (or re-connected) to a port running
spanning tree, the port takes approximately 50 seconds to cycle through the Listening, Learning, and
Forwarding states. This 50-second delay is not necessary and not desired on ports connected to IP
endpoints.
The Cisco "PortFast" feature immediately brings an interface configured as an access or trunk port
to the forwarding from a blocking state, bypassing the listening and learning states. Thus the
maximum convergence time is 20 seconds.
To prevent IP Phone unexpected resets during Spanning tree convergence time, the following System
MAO and Switch port configurations are recommended.
Configuration

MAO.

mgr > IP > IP Quality of service Category > select the Category declared in the IP domain to
which belongs the IP Phone

Modify "UDP Lost" value (or "UDP Lost"

Keepalive > Max convergence Time

and "Keepalive" values) so that UDP Lost +

Switch port.

If the IP Phone is connected to a Voice Vlan configured port, the portfast is automatically
enabled.

If the IP Phone is connected to a trunk port, the portfast should be enabled on that port as
follows.
Command

Purpose

configure terminal

Enter global configuration mode

interface interface-id

Enter the interface to be added to the VLAN

spanning-tree portfast trunk

Enable Port Fast on the trunk port

End

Return to privileged EXEC mode

show spanning-tree interface

interface-id
portfast
copy running-config startupconfig

Verify your entries

Ed. 01 / 29 December 2004

(Optional) Save your entries in the configuration file

TC0623

OmniPCX Enterprise
802.1P/Q CONFIGURATION GUIDELINES
FOR ALCATEL IP PHONES CONNECTED TO
A CISCO CATALYST SWITCH

3.3.

Speed/Duplex

One major issue with Ethernet connectivity is proper configuration of speed and duplex.
The following table is provided as a quick reference for how speed and duplex settings are
determined and typically configured. It is imperative that the speed and duplex settings be
configured properly.
Device1
Configuration
Auto-negotiate
Auto-negotiate

Device2
Configuration
Auto-negotiate
100/Half

Auto-negotiate

10/Half

Auto-negotiate

100/Full

100/Full
10/Half
100/Half

100/Full
10/Half
100/Half

Result
100/full expected and often achieved
100/half stable. Device1 senses the speed and matches
accordingly
Device1 senses no duplex negotiation, so it goes to half
duplex
10/half stable. Device1 senses the speed and matches
accordingly. Device1 senses no duplex negotiation, so it
goes to half duplex
Device1 goes to 100/Half, resulting in a duplex
mismatch undesirable. Device1 senses the speed and
matches accordingly. Device1 senses no duplex
negotiation, so it goes to half duplex
100/Full stable
Stable at respective speed and duplex

Layer 1 (L1) errors such as runts, CRC errors, FCS errors, and alignment errors often accompany a
duplex mismatch. If these errors exist and continue to increment, there is probably a duplex
mismatch or cabling problem or some other physical layer problem.
The show port <mod/port> command on Catalyst switches gives this information.
Configuration

IP Phones.
The Ethernet parameters must be configured on IP Phone as follows:

Enter the IP Phone configuration menu (while initialize click successively on [i] button and #
button).

Select menu 6 (Ethernet Links) then 1 (LAN).

Regarding the table above and the switch port configuration, select the appropriate speed,
1=10Mb, 2=100Mb or 3=Auto (Auto-negotiation).

If previous selection 1 or 2, select the duplex mode 1=Half Duplex, 2=Full Duplex

Select 0 and validate the configuration.

TC0623

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OmniPCX Enterprise
802.1P/Q CONFIGURATION GUIDELINES
FOR ALCATEL IP PHONES CONNECTED TO
A CISCO CATALYST SWITCH

IP Touch.
The Ethernet parameters must be configured on the IP Touch as follows:

Enter the IP Touch configuration menu (while initialize click successively on [i] button and #
button).

Select SoftKey "Ethernet Links" then SoftKey "LAN".

For Auto-negotiation check CheckBox "Auto", otherwise,

Regarding the table above and the switch port configuration, select the appropriate:
Speed: 10Mb, 100Mb, by selecting SoftKey "Lan Speed",
Duplex mode: Half Duplex, Full Duplex, by selecting SoftKey "Lan Duplex",

Validate twice, by the top Embedded "Validate" icon.

Select Embedded "Exit" icon to validate the configuration.

Switch port.

Command
Purpose
configure terminal
Enter global configuration mode
interface interface-id
Enter the interface to be added to the VLAN
speed {10 | 100 | 1000 | auto | Enter the appropriate speed parameter for the interface,
nonegotiate}
or enter Auto or Nonegotiate
Note: The 1000 keyword is available only for
10/100/1000 Mbps ports. 100BASE-FX ports operate
only at 100 Mbps. GBIC module ports operate only at
1000 Mbps. The Nonegotiate keyword is available
only for 1000BASE-SX, -LX, and ZX GBIC ports
duplex {auto | full | half}
Enter the duplex parameter for the interface
Note: 100BASE-FX ports operate only in full-duplex
mode.
Note: This keyword is not available on GBIC ports
End
Return to privileged EXEC mode
show interfaces interface-id

3.4.

Display the
configuration

interface

speed

and

duplex

mode

Configuration advices if following Cisco features are used

VMPS (VLAN Membership Policy Server)

If VMPS is used, the switch port to which the IP Phone or IP Touch, will be connected must be
configured in Voice Vlan mode as shown in section 3.1.3 .

Inlinepower
If the Alcatel IP Phone or IP Touch, is connected to a power supply port, please follow the
recommendation mentioned in the technical communication TC0600 Test report: Alcatel eReflexes using power over Ethernet supplied by Cisco Catalyst 3560-24PWR.

Ed. 01 / 29 December 2004

TC0623

OmniPCX Enterprise
802.1P/Q CONFIGURATION GUIDELINES
FOR ALCATEL IP PHONES CONNECTED TO
A CISCO CATALYST SWITCH

3.5.

Using Alcatel AVA (Automatic VLAN Assignment) feature

If an Alcatel IP Phone or IP Touch, uses AVA feature, the switch port should be configured as shown
in section 3.1.3 , moreover AVA can be used on terminals connected to dynamic switch ports
handling with Cisco VMPS feature (in this case the switch port must be configured in Voice Vlan
mode.
AVA is not compatible with 802.1x authentication method.

4.

TOPOLOGY

Here is described the topology used for this tutorial:

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Ed. 01 / 29 December 2004