[arin-ppml] IPV6, Not yet (OT)

Ted Mittelstaedt tedm at ipinc.net
Thu Apr 14 17:46:08 EDT 2011 

On 4/14/2011 2:24 PM, Owen DeLong wrote:
>>> I don't believe anyone here used tar or feathers. I believe we increased
>>> community awareness of the fact that Transition Networks is still trying
>>> to sell at least one product that does not support IPv6 and has no plans
>>> to do so.
>>>
>>
>> We are going to see a lot of this for some time.  It is SOP in many industries that when something new comes along that not all products get it.  Look at airbags in the auto biz - the fact is that side airbags
>> offer far more protection to a BELTED-in vehicle occupant than front
>> air bags do (front bags are basically useless to a belted individual) but the automakers held off putting them in many models in the beginning.
>
> True. However, there were also lots of manufacturers advertising the advantages of their
> side impact airbags and other manufacturers being very obviously quiet about it. I would not criticize someone for saying "Hey, I was looking at the<brand>  car the other day and it
> doesn't have side airbags." Sure, knowing the specific model would be helpful, but, knowing the brand is at least somewhat more useful than not knowing anything.
>
> Finally, we're past that point with IPv6 as far as I'm concerned. For a modern network, IPv6 is a seat belt, not a side impact airbag. It's a vital necessity and without it, you've got a serious problem maintaining anything resembling forward travel.
>
> Selling a switch or router without IPv6 today is like selling a car without a fuel tank.
> Sure, you can drive until you empty the fuel lines, but, then what?
>
>>
>>>> I think that the problem here is that since Larry didn't list the model of the switch he was looking at, the rest of us can't go look at it and
>>>> make any value judgements.  I would bet that the switch he was looking at was a cheap model of Transitions.  So really what he's mad at is not
>>>> that the vendor doesn't support IPv6, it's that he thinks the vendor's
>>>> price for IPv6 is too high.
>>>>
>>> Given that my very low end Juniper SRX-100 supports IPv6 and my
>>> relatively low-end Apple Time Capsules and Airport Extreme support
>>> IPv6, I do not buy the idea that low-end products should somehow
>>> be given a pass at this point.
>>
>> Juniper and Apple do not sell low-end products.  Their idea of low-end
>> is everyone else's mid-to-high end.  Apples to Oranges comparison.
>>
> Given that he was apparently considering this as a replacement for a 6509,
> I'd say that I'm pretty low-end by comparison.
>
>>> IPv6 is base network functionality that
>>> must be present in a device for it to be worthy of my purchase dollars
>>> at any price today.
>>>
>>> If a vendor is charging a premium for IPv6, then, I think he has a valid
>>> point.
>>>
>>
>> I don't agree.  IPv6 isn't necessary for managing a layer 2 switch that
>> does not route.  Such a switch will happily pass IPv6 packets even
>> though it's management card may ignore them.  If a network manager
>> decides to save money by buying and deploying a switch like this then while you or I may not ever do it ourselves, what is the harm?
>>
> We can agree to disagree.
>
> IPv6 management capacity and feature parity needs to at least be on
> the product roadmap, even if it isn't in currently shipping software.
> I would not buy a product that didn't have at least that today.
>
>> It takes development time and dollars for any product, and adding in
>> IPv6 support isn't any different.  The manufacturer had to spend R&D
>> dollars to add an IPv6 stack into the management card and so they are
>> going to pass that cost to the consumer.
>>
> Yes, but, they've had a decade and then some to do that. Sorry, not
> much sympathy here for the pathetic state of many vendor's products.
> Other manufacturers have found their way there, so, obviously it is
> possible. D-Link sells a whole range of $50 routers with IPv6 support.
>

I would have let your response stand until I came to that.  What good is
a router that supports IPv6 if it locks up all the time?

People praise D-link and some may say they are stable but I got a
DIR-615 rev C at home that I bought brand new that says otherwise.
It's been babied and I even still have the box for it but the
radio locks up at random intervals and it did that right out of the
box.  Of course, I didn't figure out what it was doing until it was
too late to return it to the store.

I'll wait until I see some better quality coming out of that company
before I send them anymore green.

>> If a manufacturer chooses to offer a stripped product using 5 year
>> old technology that does not support IPv6 then I do not see the harm
>> in it as long as the product isn't be whored off for the same price
>> that the new tech product is.  Some manufacturers do this and charge
>> low prices for that stuff - what do you think Walmart is stuffed with?
>>
> Again, we can agree to disagree. Further, that doesn't appear to be what
> was happening in this case. You speculated about the nature of the situation
> and your speculation was wrong. Do you want to put down the shovel
> or would you like to keep digging?
>
>>>> The fact is that selling stripped-down models of things for low prices
>>>> as an introductory model is very common practice.  For example a few months ago I bought a BlueRay player from LG.  It does not support Netflix.  But other players from LG do support Netflix.  The difference
>>>> is the other players that support Netflix are about $50 more per player.
>>>> So using your logic I should be getting on the blogs and bitching that
>>>> LG is a bad vendor for not supporting it.
>>>>
>>> Yes, but, the difference is that Netflix is an ancillary additional feature that
>>> does not relate to the performance of your LG player as a Blu Ray disc
>>> player.
>>>
>>> IPv6 is not an optional ancillary function unrelated to a switches ability to
>>> function as an IP network switch. It is core functionality. It would be like
>>> LG producing a unit for $50 less that did not support forward or reverse
>>> scan or multi-layer discs or one that only had NTSC composite output.
>>>
>>
>> Apparently you aren't aware that some manufacturers are producing "High Def" TV sets that use an actual glass picture tube.  They just took an
>> existing NTSC 480p TV set design and tacked a HD-to-NTSC converter
>> on to it.  The TV may decode a 1040p video stream but it isn't possible
>> for it's display device to show it or even 728p.
>>
> I'm aware... I had one. Your description of the internal technology (at least
> of the one I had) is not accurate. The internal resolution of the CRT was
> 1600x1080 and it did up to 1080i via component input just fine.
> It was not capable of 1080p.
>
> I wouldn't buy one today, but, 8 years ago when I bought that unit (it certainly
> wasn't a stripped down low-cost model at $2,300 for a 34" television and it
> was VERY heavy), it was a very high quality unit and the only available flat
> panel technology was gas plasma which had serious reliability and lifetime
> problems.
>

I'm not talking about 8 year old TVs.  I am typing this on a glass CRT 
running 1800 x 1440 so I'm well aware of the capabilities of a CRT.  But 
the high-end TV makers stopped using glass CRTs a while ago.  I was 
talking about hi-def CRT's that you can walk into the discount store
and buy today.  You can see the lines on them from across the room.

>> I could see LG or other manufacturer producing a combination BlueRay/DVD/VCR/HD Tuner unit that only output in NTSC for use with an
>> older TV set in the $39.95 range.  It would sell like hotcakes to
>> the blue-haired crowd who just need something for the grandkids
>> to run their new-fangled disks on when they are over.
>>
> Why bother to include a BluRay (there really isn't an e in BluRay, dude)
> reader? The blue-hair isn't going to pay the price-premium for the BluRay
> discs.
>

Because within 3-5 years the motion picture association will not be
releasing anything on DVD anymore.  Partly due to the resolution but
mainly because CSS was cracked years ago and you can rip a DVD to your
hard disk, while with BluRay they still hold out hope that they will be
able to some day release a BluRay encryption scheme that Slysoft won't 
be able to crack.

>>> Nobody would buy such a thing if they knew what they were buying.
>>>
>>
>> Would they?
>>
> Nope.
>
>> What if someone came to you and said that we want you to build us a
>> network that will be used for a big trade show that will have 300 ports
>> of fast ethernet on it, and it will need to run IPv6 and be completely
>> flat - and then after the show we are just going to pitch all the
>> switches into the garbage so we want them as cheap as possible.
>>
> I have no problem finding cheap switches with IPv6 management in them.
> The Juniper EX, Cisco 3700, Cisco 2900, and several other models work
> just fine for that.
>
>> And, by the way, they continue, every dollar you save on network
>> hardware we will contribute to ARIN's IPv6 education fund, so the
>> cheaper the gear you get, the more money goes to ARIN.
>>
> Not a problem. Show me a 48 port switch cheaper than a used 2924XL
> and I'll be surprised.
>

Show me a piece of Cisco gear on the used market that you DON'T have
to spend time flashing to something more recent than code from the 
Dinosaur Age to be able to use. ;-)

Ted

> Owen
>
>>
>> Ted
>>
>>>> Well the fact is that if you look at the LG product blogs you WILL find
>>>> people doing just that.  Fortunately, you find more people telling them to STFU because that is what they get for not doing their homework.
>>>>
>>> Sigh, yes, you can get all kinds of hostility in most consumer electronics
>>> or software forums. It doesn't inform or assist in the discussion and I
>>> wouldn't exactly hold it up as the shining example of useful public behavior.
>>>
>>> Owen
>>>
>>>> Ted
>>>>
>>>>> Owen
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> Sent from my iPad
>>>>>
>>>>> On Apr 14, 2011, at 3:00 PM, Ted Mittelstaedt<tedm at ipinc.net>    wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Well, here is a video of a Transition Networks guy
>>>>>> saying at least one of their Ethernet switches is IPv6
>>>>>> capable:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j0tw_uJXv00
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Now in answer to your other question as to why people
>>>>>> don't name names, it is because there is a saying among marketing folks:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> "bad news is better than NO news"
>>>>>>
>>>>>> I've also heard it expressed:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> "good news is good, but bad news is also good!"
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Think for a moment that this list is archived.  So a web robot
>>>>>> will be crawling the archive sooner or later and come across
>>>>>> the vendor name.  That will give the vendor a boost in the
>>>>>> search engines.  So by publicly naming the vendor, you
>>>>>> probably help them as much as you harm them.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> You should also keep in mind the old adage about sales
>>>>>> and marketing people:
>>>>>>
>>>>>> "When do you know when a marketing or sales person is lying?"
>>>>>>
>>>>>> "When their lips are moving!" ;-)
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Ted
>>>>>>
>>>>>> On 4/14/2011 10:13 AM, Aaron Wendel wrote:
>>>>>>> I don't understand why people feel it necessary not to shame these
>>>>>>> vendors in public. I would like to remove them from my list as well.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> /Sent via DROID on Verizon Wireless/
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> -----Original message-----
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>     *From: *Larry Ash<lar at mwtcorp.net>*
>>>>>>>     To: *arin-ppml at arin.net*
>>>>>>>     Sent: *Thu, Apr 14, 2011 16:31:25 GMT+00:00*
>>>>>>>     Subject: *[arin-ppml] IPV6, Not yet (OT)
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>     Sorry for the distraction,
>>>>>>>     I send this along only to remind those of us that maintain IPV4 will
>>>>>>>     die shortly,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>     Before purchasing switching equipment for the customer edge on a
>>>>>>>     metro-ethernet
>>>>>>>     deployment I questioned the manufacturer about IPV6 and here was the
>>>>>>>     reply.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>     -----------------------------------------------
>>>>>>>     The information I received from the Product Management team is that
>>>>>>>     IPV6 is
>>>>>>>     not on the road map for this product at this time. If you need any other
>>>>>>>     assistance please contact us.
>>>>>>>     ---------------------------------
>>>>>>>     This is a fairly new product that has a lot of sexy features many of
>>>>>>>     which
>>>>>>>     rely on layer3 yet the manufacturer is not even planning IPV6. I did
>>>>>>>     inform
>>>>>>>     them that I am removing them from any consideration for any of their
>>>>>>>     products.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>     The word is still not getting to management in a meaningful way.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>     Larry Ash
>>>>>>>     Network Administrator
>>>>>>>     Mountain West Telephone
>>>>>>>     123 W 1st St.
>>>>>>>     Casper, WY 82601
>>>>>>>     Office 307 233-8387
>>>>>>>     _______________________________________________
>>>>>>>     PPML
>>>>>>>     You are receiving this message because you are subscribed to
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>>>>>>>     Unsubscribe or manage your mailing list subscription at:
>>>>>>>     http://lists.arin.net/mailman/listinfo/arin-ppml
>>>>>>>     Please contact info at arin.net if you experience any issues.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>>>> PPML
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>>>>>>
>>>>>> _______________________________________________
>>>>>> PPML
>>>>>> You are receiving this message because you are subscribed to
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>>>>>
>>>
>

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