I am pretty much a novice when it comes to networking, but I think VLAN's may help with what I believe is a congested network. Here is the scenario:
CAT 6 LAN
Dell PowerEdge R70 Server 2K8 R2 (10.49.25.7)
Dell PowerConnect 2848 Switch (10.49.25.4)
35 Windows 7 Pro PC's and various other wired clients (Smart TV's, Linux server, CCTV DVR, etc) (10.49.25.31-254)
Cisco RV042G Dual WAN Router (10.49.25.1)
Cisco WAP4410N (10.49.25.9)
TWC Business Class Internet Service (35x5)
The TWC router is connected to the Cisco router which is connected to the Dell switch.
My Dell server is the primary DC, DNS and DHCP. It's connected to the Dell switch as are all the various clients listed.
We have one department that does most of their work from data stored on the primary server.
We have another department that works mostly with a web-based agency management system.
Our company also allows employees to stream music and we have at least 5 users that do so on a regular basis.
Of our 30 or so employees, most have at least a smart phone connected to our WiFi.
During the busiest part of the day our network begins to lag quite a bit. I have not done any testing, but I think segmenting the network might help us with congestion.
Assuming VLAN's are a good approach, this is what I need to be able to do:
1) Allow the VLAN's to communicate with each other as we allow users to share out folders on their PC's
2) Ensure all VLAN's can communicate with the server and our Cisco router which acts as an Internet gateway.
Does this make sense? How do I configure the switch to do this? I checked the specs and it has L3 routing capability. I've already setup the VLAN's and assigned the ports, but I've left the PVID's at 1 for now, because when I assigned them I lost server and Internet gateway connectivity, obviously because I'm missing a very critical piece. Can anyone help me with steps to configure this setup?
Thank you.