How to configure Voice VLAN on Omada Switches using Omada Controller

Contents

Objective

Requirements

Introduction

Configuration

Verification

Conclusion

Objective

This article introduces the configuration of Voice VLAN on Omada switches when using Omada Controller to manage the devices.

Requirements

• Omada Smart, L2+ and L3 switches
• Omada Controller (Software Controller / Hardware Controller / Cloud Based Controller, V5.9 and above)

Introduction

This article is about configuring Voice VLAN on Omada switches when using the Omada Controller to manage the devices, for the configuration without Omada Controller, please refer to the FAQ: How to configure Voice VLAN to optimize the transmission of voice traffic on TP-Link Smart and Managed Switches using the new GUI?

As IP phones are being widely used these days, configurations on switches are needed to ensure the experience when using IP phones to avoid lags, quality degradation, jitter or noise. The voice traffic is time sensitive, that’s why we need to configure a voice VLAN for the specific usage of voice traffic and set a priority for the packets to make sure they are forwarded in time, therefore the quality of phone calls could be assured.

Voice VLAN uses OUI to match the packets sent by the IP phones and tag them with a designated VLAN ID and 802.1p priority. Which results in all the voice traffic running in a separate VLAN and could be forwarded prior to other traffic.

Configuration

Step 1. Adopt the switch on Omada Controller.

First, adopt the switches which are directly connected to the IP phones.

Step 2. Create a 802.1Q VLAN for the use of voice VLAN.

To assign a VLAN as voice VLAN, we need to create an 802.1Q VLAN first. Go to Settings>Wired Networks>LAN>Networks, click Create New LAN, create a new VLAN, you can choose to configure it as interface or VLAN. A TP-Link gateway is needed to be adopted in the Controller when you choose to create the interface. Here I only adopted the switch to show the configuration, so I will create it as VLAN and apply it on switches only.

For other parameters just keep default or configure as you need.

Step 3. Check if you have the appropriate port profile created.

After created the voice VLAN 2, the default port profile “all” will be automatically changed to VLAN1 untagged, PVID=1 and VLAN 2 tagged, however, the port with voice VLAN enabled will join the corresponding VLAN as untagged automatically when the voice traffic is detected. Therefore, we don't need to add the voice VLAN into the port profile, for example, here we only need VLAN1 untagged and PVID=1, which is the same as the Default port profile created automatically, so we don't need to create a new one.

If you still need more tagged or untagged VLAN set on the port, go to Settings>Wired Networks>LAN>Switch Profile, click Create New Port Profile and edit the port profile based on your needs.

Step 4. Apply the correct port profile to the port connecting to IP phones.

Go to Devices page, click on the switch to enter its private configuration page, in Ports, change to the correct port profile for the ports you are connecting to IP phones and you want to enable Voice VLAN on, for example, here I will change port 1’s port profile to Default.

Till now, the configuration of Voice VLAN on the Controller GUI has been finished, we need to use CLI templates to issue the commands to the switches.

Step 5. Edit the CLI commands.

The CLI commands should include these configurations:

• Enable Voice VLAN on the switch globally.
• Assign an 802.1Q VLAN as the Voice VLAN.
• Enable Voice VLAN on the downlink ports (directly connected to IP phones).
• Configure the 802.1p priority of Voice VLAN.

Note: Check if your device’s OUI is included in the OUI table, if not, add manually.

In this example, the Voice VLAN I created is VLAN 2, and on this switch, I’m connecting the IP phones on port 1, and I want to set its 802.1p priority as 7 which is the highest. The CLI commands go like this:

voice vlan 2

interface gigabitEthernet 1/0/1

voice vlan

#

voice vlan priority 7

Step 6. Check if your device’s OUI is included in the default OUI table.

You can connect the console cable or the terminal from Controller to log into the CLI of switch, the Controller’s terminal is located in Tools>Terminal, change the Device Type to Switch, in Sources, choose this switch, then click Open Terminal.

In the terminal, enter “show voice vlan oui-table” under privileged EXEC Mode (enter “en” after logged in) to check the current OUI table and see if your device’s OUI is included, below shows the default OUI we offer:

You need to check if your device’s OUI is included in this default OUI table, if not, add manually.

For example, my device’s OUI is 00-E0-4C which is not included, so with manually adding the OUI, the whole command should goes like:

voice vlan 2

interface gigabitEthernet 1/0/1

voice vlan

#

voice vlan priority 7

voice vlan oui 00:E0:4C oui-desc TP-Test

You can also finish the configuration on the GUI without using the Omada Controller and export the config file, then copy these commands from the config file, which will make sure there’s no error.

Step 7. Create the CLI template and issue the configuration to devices.

Go to Settings>CLI Configuration>Device CLI, click Create New Device CLI Profile and edit.

Click Next and select the device you want to apply the commands on, click Confirm to select.

Click Save. Now the CLI is still inactive, click Apply to start the application process.

Connect the terminal and enter “show running-config” to check if these commands are successfully applied.

You can also click the “show running config” button in Devices page (Controller V5.14 and later)

Here, the running config includes the commands I have just applied, which means the configuration is finished.

Verification

The configuration of Voice VLAN has finished and it should be working normally now, if you are interested, you can follow the steps below to validate:

I have added the OUI 00:E0:4C to the OUI table, so now I use the device with this OUI to send packets and validate if Voice VLAN is taking effect.

Currently all the ports’ native VLANs are VLAN1, which means the packets should be captured without VLAN tags, but if the Voice VLAN is taking effect, the packets from this device will be tagged with VLAN 2 and 802.1p priority 7.

Voice VLAN is now enabled on port1, so connect the device to port 1 and send normal IPv4 unicast packets, then use port mirroring to capture.

Results like below, from the screenshot you can see that this packet’s source MAC address matches the OUI we have just set, and it has a VLAN tag with 802.1p priority 7 and VLAN ID 2, same as the parameters we have configured for Voice VLAN, which means the Voice VLAN is working.

Please note that network adapters on Windows may discard the 802.1Q VLAN header, so if you find that the packets you captured are untagged, please check if your network adapter captures the VLAN tags normally by sending some tagged packets or monitor the traffic in other VLANs.

Conclusion

Till now we have finished introducing the configuration of Voice VLAN on Omada switches through Omada Controller and provided a simple verification. If there’s still a problem, please contact TP-Link Technical Support.

Get to know more details of each function and configuration please go to Download Center to download the manual of your product.