Does Sonic support NATIVE ipv6?

[tbessie]

I know that Sonic has the ipv6 tunnel feature, but why is that? What if all my home equipment was set up for ipv6 - computers, router, etc. Does the Sonic DSL modem not support ipv6 natively? Does the equipment within Sonic's own network not support it natively?

Is there currently any way to have ipv6 all the way through from my home, through router, gateway, and out into the rest of the world?

- Tim

[thulsa_doom]

Hello,

This is on the radar as something we want to implement, but we do not have end-to-end native IPV6 support yet. Dane commented on this a while back here.

[tbessie]

Hello,

This is on the radar as something we want to implement, but we do not have end-to-end native IPV6 support yet. Dane commented on this a while back here.

Ah, thanks! I searched through the forums, but didn't see that one.

I decided to write this as Slashdot had an article on ipv6 today, and I was thinking "Yeah, why DON'T I have that at home?" Heh.

- Tim

[dane]

We do offer IPv6 today, via a 6in4 tunnel, which has been available to our customers since 2003. It is a bit complex to set up, but we were one of the very first ISPs to offer IPv6 support at all. An Apple engineer & customer told us that the IPv6 support in the early Airport wouldn't have been completed without him being able to take the equipment home and test it using our network and IPv6 support.

We will soon offer client-side native IPv6, meaning our equipment will provide your LAN devices with a native IPv6 address. This will require an update to the CPE, and it will be supported in the equipment we are now shipping, the Pace 4111N. Because the equipment at the edges of portions of our network does not support end-to-end native IPv6, we must tunnel IPv6 using 6RD across portions of the network. This solution will allow us to provide IPv6 even to our legacy AT&T DSL customers, who are on edge equipment which will never itself support IPv6. For customers who opt not to use the Pace equipment, we anticipate providing 6RD end-point settings so that they could terminate 6RD in the router of their choice. Details are TBD. See also RFC 5569: http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc5569

The Internet for the foreseeable future will include portions which are IPv4-only, and carriers will tunnel across those seamlessly and transparent to the end-user, as with our edge-deployed 6RD IPv6 CPE. It's also notable that the carrier with the most IPv6 customers today is Free.fr, who was a very early adopter of the 6RD solution. Presentation here: http://ripe58.ripe.net/content/presenta ... 6-free.pdf

[tbessie]

Thanks for all that info, Dane! Very helpful.

I wonder when most of the world will be on ipv6. Gotta happen eventually, I'd think.

My dad lives in France, and he's on Free - next time I'm visiting him, I think I'll check out his FreeBox setup and see those ipv6 addresses myself!

- Tim

[dane]

My dad lives in France, and he's on Free - next time I'm visiting him, I think I'll check out his FreeBox setup and see those ipv6 addresses myself!

- Tim

Fusion itself is inspired by Free, FYI.

[tbessie]

My dad lives in France, and he's on Free - next time I'm visiting him, I think I'll check out his FreeBox setup and see those ipv6 addresses myself!

- Tim

Fusion itself is inspired by Free, FYI.

What about it was inspiring?

- Tim

[dane]

My dad lives in France, and he's on Free - next time I'm visiting him, I think I'll check out his FreeBox setup and see those ipv6 addresses myself!

- Tim

Fusion itself is inspired by Free, FYI.

What about it was inspiring?

- Tim

The business model, which is: everything, unlimited, for one price. Sounds like Fusion, doesn't it?

This model has become the dominant model in Europe today, and it makes sense. It costs no more to deliver 20Mbps than 10Mbps over the same copper pair - it's just a setting in the DSLAM. Similarly, voice features and voice usage are marginal costs, and declining, so they should be included as well. Same goes for static IP, web hosting, etc. It's this philosophy that drives the Fusion product road map.

The other end of the business model spectrum is the tiered, "$5 more to go faster" configuration, and with features such as voicemail, caller ID or a static IP all offered as add-on costs. The goal in that model is to drive up average revenue per user per month (ATPU) by segmenting the market, artificially limiting the service. In broadband access, speed limiting or usage caps are the examples, in voice service it's features like voicemail or caller ID, or expensive long distance calling. When these are offered at a high monthly rate, they are not being provided at prices which are in line with their costs today, and they end up supporting a higher ARPU which allows for an apparent low price on the main offering, but no one really pays that rate because most want a feature or two.

[tbessie]

Thanks again, Dane, for all that info - I'm learning a lot!

- Tim

[dohring]

When the 6rd-supporting equipment arrives, can some of us help beta-test it? ie: give us the 6rd border router ip, and 6rd prefix.