IPv6 support on Virgin media

[dgcarter]

Does anyone know whether (and if so when) Virgin plan to implement IPv6 on its network?

[ChrisJenkins]

I'm still seeing the usual speed of around 20 Mbit/s give or take. According to my monitoring it hasn't changed significantly since I started monitoring on Aug 7th.

[jamesmacwhite]

Testing with iperf3, I don't see any noticeable changes from previous tests/historic really. Other than using my own Linode VPS as the iperf3 server, because bouygues.iperf.fr seems to be busy half the time and I can't be bothered to wait for a free slot.

Reverse mode, remote host is sending
[  5] local 2001:470:xxxx:xx::x port 56146 connected to 2a01:7e00:e000:xxx::x port 5201
[ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bitrate
[  5]   0.00-1.00   sec  1.64 MBytes  13.8 Mbits/sec
[  5]   1.00-2.00   sec  1.48 MBytes  12.4 Mbits/sec
[  5]   2.00-3.00   sec  1.80 MBytes  15.1 Mbits/sec
[  5]   3.00-4.00   sec  1.15 MBytes  9.66 Mbits/sec
[  5]   4.00-5.00   sec  1.93 MBytes  16.2 Mbits/sec
[  5]   5.00-6.00   sec  1.54 MBytes  12.9 Mbits/sec
[  5]   6.00-7.00   sec  1.70 MBytes  14.2 Mbits/sec
[  5]   7.00-8.00   sec  1.35 MBytes  11.3 Mbits/sec
[  5]   8.00-9.00   sec  1.65 MBytes  13.8 Mbits/sec
[  5]   9.00-10.00  sec  1.68 MBytes  14.1 Mbits/sec
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[ ID] Interval           Transfer     Bitrate         Retr
[  5]   0.00-10.00  sec  16.4 MBytes  13.7 Mbits/sec   28             sender
[  5]   0.00-10.00  sec  15.9 MBytes  13.3 Mbits/sec                  receiver

iperf Done.

I think we are probably going to have to wait it out for a while before seeing an potential improvement. The problem has been on-going for a while, it's probably going to take a while for Virgin Media to even look at it, before they make an assessment on the what the core issue is. If anything, I'd had least be somewhat happy with them officially providing the detail on what the problem is, given as far as I know, they are the only ISP in the UK with this issue. Although reports from Vodafone/UPC in Czech Republic, suggested they have the same problem too.

[adhawkins]

There's definitely something going on. I'm back to 300 MBits/sec for both IPv4 and IPv6.

Andy 

[jamesmacwhite]

Can I tunnel off your IP Andy? Ha ha.

😞

Wonder if they are experimenting with certain routers in the network and or packages.

[ksim]

that was the case when we investigated it for the first time, some customers had no issues with tunnel speeds sometimes, most of the users saw 12-20 all the time.

[jamesmacwhite]

Indeed and now we've seen those with high speeds suddenly drop down to the same most others were seeing to then go back up again, so at this point it would seem likely something in their network given the transient nature of it.

[ksim]

it was clear long ago that the problem is in their network, we were pointing to the routing issues, speed issues, did different tests, I have no idea why you decided that it is somehow SH3 problem, the issue is in VM engineers, they are broken. This is why IPv6 wasn't deployed, they just not able to do that, all the rumors that the delay is connected with full DS instead of DSLite have no connection to the reality and makes no sense for LG to do.

[adhawkins]

---

@jamesmacwhite wrote:

Indeed and now we've seen those with high speeds suddenly drop down to the same most others were seeing to then go back up again, so at this point it would seem likely something in their network given the transient nature of it.

---

By 'their' network, do you mean my home network, or Virgin's network?

I don't see how anything in my network could be changing to give such a dramatic effect on the throughput I'm seeing for ipv6. I wouldn't rule it out obviously, but it seems unlikely.

Just run another test and it's still at 300 ish for both. Will see if I can work out how to get iperf to run a regular test on one of my linux boxes.

Andy

[jamesmacwhite]

Sorry, to clarify I meant Virgin Media's network, not your LAN.

[jamesmacwhite]

@ksim

I never decided anything, just providing alternative view points, based on more recent information that was found from other sources. The Vodafone/UPC Czech Republic post on root.cz was the main thing that made me think about it a bit more. No one has an official answer or could confirm the exact problem so it was a case of looking at all the potential angles on that one, just trying to cover all bases. Nothing I've said I'd consider to be "the facts" given I don't work for VM.

However I agree, with all the recent happenings I don't think it can be. Virgin Media don't know given their quote on the ISP Review article was pretty vague.

A Virgin Media Spokesperson told ISPreview.co.uk:

“We’re currently investigating this issue further which affects those customers who choose to use 6in4 IPv6 tunnels. This may require a firmware update from the vendor to fix the problem.”

Hopefully it becomes more clear as they look into, I hope.