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Hi,

I live in Australia. My ISP is Internode.

The modem/router I use is an FritzBox 7390. It's quite a new model ... however for the previous few years I was using a Billion 7404VNPX which also now supports IPv6 (via a recent firmware update).

Apologies for my inaccurate terminology re prefix delegation. I'm new to all this and not a particular expert in networking. The fact sheet from my ISP about IPv6 says, verbatim:

What will [connecting to the IPv6 trial] give me?

        * Your existing IPv4 address (if static) and route(s)
        * A dual-stack IPv4/IPv6 PPP session
        * A dynamic /64 IPv6 prefix for your PPP session
        * A stable /60 IPv6 prefix for your LAN (if you are using a router with Prefix Delegation)

Your IPv6 Access Device/router should assign /64 subnets to it's interfaces after it obtains a DHCPv6 PD lease. It should then offer the prefix to your hosts via IPv6 Stateless Address Autoconfiguration. In more complicated setups you may choose to use DHCPv6 as well.

Currently the addresses assigned via Prefix Delegation for your LAN will be stable (not dynamic).

Hopefully this answers some of your questions. It seems to me that several of the ISPs in Australia are fairly on the ball when it comes to IPv6. Internode is probably most advanced but a few of the others are also getting ready to trial it in the next year I believe. This may or may not have something to do with the fact that Australia is within APNIC's area of responsibility. APNIC is due to run out of IPv4s first among all the RIRs due to the rapid expansion of networked services in Asia.

Some consumer routers have already supported it for some time: e.g. the Apple Airport Express, some NetComm routers, Fritz!Box (popular in Europe, mostly). For the rest, the firmware will be forthcoming, no doubt. My DSL modem/router manufacturer (Billion, http://www.billion.com/) has already released firmware updates to some models to enable native dual stack. My particular model is due to be updated 'Q1 2011', so within the next two months. Which is great as my ISP already has native IPv6 available to its end customers now and a fully IPv6 backbone, so it should be a seamless transition.

Having said that there are slack router manufacturers and crappy ISPs that have sat on their hands for too long and will now have to madly scramble. (Or implement carrier grade NAT which is an ugly kludge - I would immediately leave any such ISP that implemented it).

There is one small problem however: some cheap/old routers don't physically have the onboard memory to fit a firmware containing both an IPv4 and IPv6 stack. So there will definitely be some users that need to physically replace their hardware, unfortunately.

Hardly implausible, Tony. You're not a techhead, you're not an economist and you certainly aren't Prime Minister material. I'd vote Liberal if Mal' was leader of the opposition but Tony is the Gimp without a mask on. BTW, Billion already have a GPON home router ready to go on the new upgraded NBN.

Yeah I think you're mostly right. In my case, I would be 'the neighbourhood geek'. And I almost always recommend a router that's a step up on the default stuff ISPs try to sell you.

Personally I use a Billion 7404 VNPX. Chose it mostly cause I wanted gigabit ports on the LAN side, VoIP support, and external antennae. Cost a lot more (like, 3x-4x as much) as what an ISP would recommend, but it's stable and hasn't crashed on me once (even after purposefully attempting to fill its NAT tables by P2Ping with thousands of connections).

Like any consumer level gear it has its shortcomings ... but I didn't really want to shell out for Cisco or other enterprise-grade stuff for home use.

Have a look at Billion http://www.billion.com/ They may not be Open Source like DD-WRT etc, however for around the same cost as your Belkin, Netgear, Buffalo etc - they totally kick ass, and generally give you a much more feature rich feature set. Some models are 802.11n + gigabit ports + DSL or FTTH + USB for 3G backup path if DSL or FTTH goes down. They have voice integrated models too for VoIP + VPN as well so they are certainly worth looking at.

XP SP3 sends out DHCP packets with Option 43 data (including Microsoft's "Vendor Specific Information"), which Service Pack 2 (SP2) did not. However, Option 43 data is not compatible with 5200 series router's original definition, which causes the problem (as reported from a notice from Billion)

RFC2132 says: "Servers not equipped to interpret the vendor-specific information sent by a client MUST ignore it (although it may be reported)."

It seems to be a Billion's fault...not Microsoft's

Ack. Apparently TFA doesn't. But Billion themselves do.

Quote from their website:

"After detail analysis, we found that Windows XP SP3 sent out the DHCP packet with the Option 43 data (include Microsoft's 'Vendor Specific Information'), but Windows XP SP2 sent out the DHCP packet without the Option 43 data. However, the Option 43 data is not compatible with Billion's original definition, so it will cause this problem. The affected firmware versions of BiPAC 5200 series are 2.9.8.x and 2.11.0.x~2.11.33.x. There is no impact to BiPAC 5200 series if the firmware is 2.10.x.x. Please check Appendix A for checking your current firmware version."

http://au.billion.com/downloads/Notice-Billion-5200-series-via-Windows-SP3.pdf

he named a fucking number.... o_0 damn, i guess that is considered work now. and if it is the name of a number, it can't be copyrighted. i mean, is thousand.com going to be sued? how about billion.com? i hope kanser reads this, or someone mentions this to him, because he is an idiot who got a kid to name a really big number. whoop de fucking doo. give this guy the Nobel >_