[November 11, 2010]

Suppliers Demonstrate IPv6 Support at CableLabs® Interop

In a major accomplishment, CableLabs (News - Alert)^® successfully completed a PacketCable^™ 2.0 SIP call over IPv6 during a two-week IPv6 interoperability event October 11-22. This was the fourth in a series of semi-annual IPv6 interoperability events.

IPv6 is the next-generation Internet Protocol and offers virtually an unlimited number of IP addresses compared with IPv4, the current version. IPv4 is expected to exhaust all addresses attainable from the central authority, Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA), within the next year, and the regional authorities in the subsequent 12 months. IPv6 will enable cable operators to deliver innovative communications and entertainment services to the exploding volume of IP devices, such as smart-phones and other consumer IP devices that are driving up the need for more IP addresses.

"Suppliers have demonstrated significant progress in their support for IPv6. This is a very important technology for cable operators, and it is encouraging to see such a strong commitment from the industry's supply community," said Chris Donley, Project Director - Network Protocols at CableLabs.

"The recent CableLabs IPv6 interop proved extremely useful for Cox (News - Alert)," said Jason Weil, Principal Architect Technology Architecture, Cox Communications. "The CableLabs' team worked with Cox engineers to mimic our IPv6 dual-stack trial configuration which included a DOCSIS^® 3.0 cable modem, stand-alone home gateway supporting DHCPv6 Prefix Delegation and Windows 7 client as part of the interop. We succesfully tested IPv6 provisioning with multiple software vendors. The key to the interop success was having senior support engineers from all the participating suppliers onsite and working as a team through any issues in an expedited and efficient manner," he added.

Representatives from 17 companies worked together to test IPv6 interoperability in a range of products including: DOCSIS 3.0 cable modems (CMs), DOCSIS 2.0+IPv6 CMs, cable modem termination systems (CMTSs), PacketCable E-DVAs, e-set-top boxes, provisioning servers, home gateways, large-scale NAT servers, and test tools.

Companies that participated in the interop included: A10, Arris, Broadcom, Cisco, Comcast, Cox, D-Link, Incognito, Motorola, SCTE, Shenick, Spirent, STMicroelectronics, Technicolor, Texas Instruments (News - Alert), Ubee, and University of New Hampshire Interop Lab.

Participants also tested DOCSIS IPv6 provisioning, Internet video streaming, eRouter and standalone home router configuration, and interoperability with PCs running Windows XP, Windows 7, Mac OS X, and Linux. In addition, CableLabs demonstrated NAT444 and Dual-Stack Lite, two important IPv4/IPv6 coexistence technologies.

CableLabs' interoperability events provide vendors with an informal laboratory setting in which they have the opportunity to test their latest products within CableLabs' headends and testing environment, determine compliance with industry specifications and the ability of their products to interoperate with other devices in an end-to-end system.

Founded in 1988 by members of the cable television industry, Cable Television Laboratories is a non-profit research and development consortium that is dedicated to pursuing new cable telecommunications technologies and to helping its cable operator members integrate those advancements into their business objectives. Cable operators from around the world are members. CableLabs maintains additional web sites at www.cablenet.org, www.ebif.tv and www.tru2way.com.

Advanced Digital Cable^™, CableCARD^™, CableHome^®, CableLabs^®, CableNET^®, CablePC^™, DCAS^™, DPoE^™, DOCSIS^®, EBIF^™, Go2Broadband^SM, M-Card^™, OpenCable^™, PacketCable^™, and tru2way^® are marks of Cable Television Laboratories, Inc.

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