N-TRON 500 Series Stacked Switches IGMP Multicast Limitations
With Quality of Service (QOS) DISABLED, as in factory defaults out of box:
To prevent IGMP Multicast congestion problems, the following rules should be followed for multicast frames of up to 256 bytes each:
- IGMP Snooping should be enabled, as in factory defaults out of box, and other multicasting devices in the LAN should be compliant.
- No more than three stages of switches should be stacked if the bottom layer is composed of simultaneously multicasting devices. ( Reference the figure below.)
- In stage 1, all ports of any 500 series ’---A’ switch may be connected to multicasting devices. NOTE: A fiber ring, backbone, or trunked architecture is basically stage 1 for these purposes.
- In stage 2:
- 508/509: No limit to uplinks from stage 1.
- 516/517/524/526:
- no limit to the number of 508/509’s uplinking from stage 1.
- Limit = 15 of 516/517’s uplinking from stage 1.
- Limit = 10 of 524/526’s uplinking from stage 1.
NOTE: Simultaneous wirespeed unicast traffic has virtually no effect on these limits.
- Stage 3 should have no more than 200 multicasting nodes below it.

With Quality of Service (QOS) ENABLED, which would have to be manually configured:
To prevent IGMP Multicast congestion problems, the following rules should be followed for multicast frames of up to 256 bytes each, when QOS is enabled:
- IGMP Snooping should be enabled, as in factory defaults out of box, and other multicasting devices in the LAN should be compliant.
- No more than three stages of switches should be stacked if the bottom layer is composed of simultaneously multicasting devices. ( Reference the figure below.)
- In stage 1, all ports of any 500 series ’---A’ switch may be connected to multicasting devices. NOTE: A fiber ring, backbone, or trunked architecture is basically stage 1 for these purposes.
- 4. In stage 2:
- 508/509:
- no limit to the number of 508/509’s uplinking from stage 1.
- Limit = 6 of 516/517’s uplinking from stage 1.
- Limit = 4 of 524/526’s uplinking from stage 1.
- 516/517/524/526:
- Limit = 12 of 508/509’s uplinking from stage 1.
- Limit = 6 of 516/517’s uplinking from stage 1.
- Limit = 4 of 524/526’s uplinking from stage 1. NOTE: Simultaneous wirespeed unicast traffic has virtually no effect on these limits.
- Stage 3 should have no more than 90 multicasting nodes below it.

The information in this white paper was first published by N-Tron. In an effort to bring out customers the best possible information, B&B Electronics has received permission to republish this document. B&B Electronics thanks N-Tron for allowing us to distribute this information to our customers. You can visit their site at http://www.n-tron.com.
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