IPv6 Transition Measurements in LTE and VHT Wi-Fi Mobile Networks

Abstract

Full digital connectivity of the Internet of Things (IoT) devices demands several requirements including high-speed networks and a large number of IP addresses. The long term evolution (LTE) and very high throughput (VHT) 802.11ac networks are among the alternatives that can fulfill the speed requirements. To provide a large number of IP addresses, in addition to IPv4, LTE and 802.11ac also support IPv6. However, while the full digital connectivity cannot be fulfilled by IPv4 due to its limited address space and failure to support the scalability of the IoT applications, another major problem is that the potential benefits of IPv6 for LTE and 802.11ac mobile networks are completely ambiguous. The issue is further increased along with the design complexities inherent in LTE and 802.11ac infrastructures. Therefore, there are increasing concerns for cellular carriers and mobile service providers regarding migration to IPv6-only and whether the users in LTE-IPv6-only and 802.11ac-IPv6-only networks can achieve better performance than IPv4. To address the challenges associated with deploying IPv6-only in LTE and 802.11ac networks and quantify the performance, this work proposes a model. The model consists of a simulation environment with four distinct networks: LTE-IPv6-only, LTE-IPv4-only, 802.11ac-IPv6-only, and 802.11ac-IPv4-only. The model is further extended by setting up a real-world testbed environment to include four networks for replication of those simulations. To assure the most comprehensive environmental evaluation of the model, 128 distinct scenarios are developed and implemented, and the results are obtained in terms of quality of service parameters. The testbed results are compared to those of simulations to precisely assess the model. INDEX TERMS LTE, VHT, IPv6, QoS, Internet-of-Things (IoT).

Link Quality Improvement of Long-Term Evolution and 802.11ax in High-Density Areas

“…However, when network reliability for optimizing the packet delivery process is important, IPv6 performs better than IPv4 by providing a lower packet loss ratio. The above TCP findings in terms of higher delay and lower loss ratio for IPv6 protocol are also consistent with the experimental testbed results provided in [7,[44][45][46] under different conditions. Now, to examine if IPv6 can meet the performance requirements of time-sensitive applications, we further extend the analysis and implement both IPv6 and IPv4 in dense LTE, HEW-2.4, and HEW-5 networks.…”

“…Although a 1400B transport payload slightly improves the performance of the end users in the HEW-5 network in terms of the lower loss ratio and delay, the level of improvement is not considerable. These results are also consistent with the experimental testbed results for LTE in [44] and HEW in [42]. The reason that changing the payload size does not influence the performance of the LTE, HEW-2.4, and HEW-5 network is related 23 Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing to the fact that they reach their saturation limits by a large number of packet transmissions of the 100 active users at the same time.…”

“…The issue gets even worse with TCP transmissions on the network with all the extra overheads compared to UDP. These results are also confirmed in the MATLAB simulator [43] and experimental testbed [44]. Consequently, based on the results, the connection limit of the LTE network is identified up to 30 to ensure reliable services for the error-sensitive data.…”

Organizational Resistance to Technology Diffusion: The Case of IPv6

“…IPv6 traffic also varies from region to region, and the majority originates in the US [5], while Google's IPv6 statistics show that in most parts of the world, it remains almost non-existent [6]. The lack of IPv6 diffusion is perhaps even more surprising given that the fundamental reason for the development of IPv6 was the limited address space available in IPv4 [7], and indeed, IPv6 advocates expected that its much larger address space would be the "key factor" that drove its success [5].…”