6 to 4 NAT-PT scalability

[zssvfcs88]

Hi All,

We are running a project to use pure IPv6 to get access to IPv4 services, such as webs.

In this project, we are using 6 to 4 NAT-PT to translate IPv6 address to IPv4 address.

However, we are going to support tens of thousands users to use this service, the scalability becomes an issue. I have heard of some hardware like CGSE which could support large amount of 6 to 4 translations. Did anyone has experience on using this Engine?

Can this engine be supported by Cisco 10K routers?

Thanks a lot for your help!!!!!!!

Regards,

Ian Zhang

[Phillip Remaker]

You generally want to lean away from NAT-PT, since its statefulness tends to limit its scalability.  Also, NAT-PT has been relegated to historical status in RFC 4966.

Finally, what is the rationale to make an IPv6 only network?  For the short term, dual stack would be a better way to go.

For a pure IPv6 network,"servers" can be made IPv4 accessible using proxies/relays on L4 or L7 and "clients" on IPv6 can use NAT64 plus DNS64 (unbound or bind patches) to get greater scalability.

See http://www.cisco.com/en/US/prod/collateral/iosswrel/ps6537/ps6553/white_paper_c11-558744-00_ns1017_Networking_Solutions_White_Paper.html for more detail.

[dwing]

Yes, ASR and CGSE blade can support lots of translations.  Both support stateless translation today, see http://www.cisco.com/go/cgv6.  However, stateless translation cannot be used if you're going from the IPv6 Internet to an IPv4 network (that is, from the IPv6 Internet to your own IPv4 servers).  For that, you need stateful translation.  I don't believe we have announced dates for availability of products that support stateful NAT64.