Baseline IPv6 performance testing with IxChariot
Chris Buerger
Product Manager, Ixia

IPv6 and its set of well-documented benefits, see Ixia's IPv6 White Paper, have driven an increasing number of operating system and network equipment vendors to offer IPv6 support in their product lines that previously supported only IPv4. Today, market segments such as National Research Networks (NRNs) and connected university campuses, federal, and government organizations have deployed nationwide IPv6 networks. In addition, engineering organizations working on IPv6 applications or appliances, as well as service providers, require IPv6 capabilities in new product acquisitions.

From a testing perspective, the transition to IPv6 implies that both the entire network and its underlying components have to be stress-tested to meet the forecast amount of IPv6 traffic. The increasing availability of IPv6 applications on user systems will create the expectation that these new applications will offer the same performance as any of their IPv4 predecessors.

From an overall deployment perspective, many equipment vendors and enterprises advocate an IPv6 transition strategy that begins from the edges of the network and moves in toward the core. Such a strategy has the benefits of better visibility of deployment costs as well as providing a precise focus on the needs of applications migrating to IPv6.

IxChariot is the industry-standard test tool to assist companies with their pre-deployment tests and transitions to IPv6. Its wide range of IPv6 test capabilities allows an exact impact assessment when deploying IPv6-based applications across dual-stack (initially) and then native IPv6 environments. The test cases in this document provide an outline of some of the key capabilities in IxChariot, and are based on a popular Layer 3 dual stack switch common to the edge networks of many larger organizations.

Overview

1. Dual stack IPv4/IPv6 performance verification

2. IPv6 Internet traffic performance test

3. IPv6 Internet traffic emulation with stateless IPv6 IMIX traffic for additional network congestion

4. IPv6 Internet traffic performance test with IPv6 DoS attack

5. Basic IPv6 VoIP testing

Read the complete report, Baseline IPv6 performance testing with IxChariot.