It’s not a secret that we are running out of IP addresses which is why a new standard of IP, IPV6 was developed and introduced. IPv6 is coming fast, faster than you think.

According to an estimate, we will run out of IP’s on the current standard, IPv4 by the end of 2010 or early 2011.

I decided to dive into the new standard and learn more about the new technology and how it is different from the current standard. This article lists out few interesting facts about IPv6 which is here to stay for many generations of internet users.

IPv4 is Here to Stay

First things first! Even though IPv4 IP’s might run out, IPv4 is here to stay for a long time to come. Upgrading from IPv4 to IPv6 is not a necessity as the newer OS versions are equipped to handle the upcoming change. Microsoft Windows XP SP2 and above come loaded with IPv6 stack.

For the ones who are in no hurry to upgrade, your machine is capable of working with another machine boasting of IPv6 in perfect harmony. This backward compatibility will keep IPv4 around for years or even decades to come.

IPv6 is 128bit

The 32bit based IPv4 delivered enough IP addresses to spread the internet technology in all corners of the globe, but, did not hold enough IP addresses to power the wild growth in countries like India and China.

To solve this problem, IPv6 is 128bit based which can generate enough IP addresses that can power generations of regular internet users and the technology enthusiasts around the globe.

IPv6 IP addresses are Hexadecimal

Gone are the days when you remembered a 4 blocked IP address with 3 numbers in each block. Not only IPv6 numbers will be a lot longer, it will also include alphabets along with the numbers, but these values are not case sensitive.

So get use to the idea of seeing alphabets in your IP.

IPv6 IP’s use Colons not Decimals (example IP’s)

This is another change common users will notice. IPv4 uses Dots “.” Between the blocks, however, IPv6 uses “:” between the blocks.

Example IPv6 IP’s:

• 2001:0618:71A3:08D3:1319:8A2E:0370:7017 – A typical IPv6 address
• 0:0:0:0:0:0:0:1 – Loopback address
• FF01::42 – Compressed address
• :::10.0.0.20 – IPv4 Compressed to IPv6

IPv6 in Hard Numbers

According to mathematicians IPv6 is capable of delivering 340,300,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000, that’s over three hundred and forty duodecillion IP’s.

To put this in perspective, IPv4 could deliver just about 4 billion IP’s (in theory).

Not all IPv6 IP’s are Usable

Due to reserved and unassigned bits in 128bit address, IPv6 will generate far less IP addresses than it is capable of. 64bits out of 128bits are reserved for the interface ID or the Mac Address as we know it which is one of the reasons of the reduced number of usable IP addresses.

In practicality IPv6 is expected to create over 18 trillion IP addresses. Worried? Don’t be. With 18 trillion IP’s, every living person on this planet can be assigned over 3000 dedicated IP’s each.

Disable IPv6 on Windows Machines

If you ever need to disable IPv6 on your machine for whatever reason, here is how to do it.

1. Launch Regedit and navigate to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE hive.  The full path is:HKLMSYSTEMCurrentControlSetServicesTcpip6Parameters
2. Create a DWORD called DisabledComponents
3. Set the Hex Value Data to ffffffff  This displays as 0xffffffff (4294967295)
4. Reboot and IPv6 will be disabled.

So, will you be the early adopters of this technology?

Image credit: fix6.net