NAT64 availability: At the moment, there is no publicly-available production-grade NAT64 solution. Viagenie has produced a proof-of-concept open-source code and Cisco and Ericsson are supposedly field-testing their solutions.
Which IPv4 to IPv6 translation solution is best?
Theoretically, NAT64 should be the preferred solution because it forces IPv6 deployment on the new clients and thus nudges the carriers and CPE equipment manufacturers in the right direction. Unfortunately, most of the DSL or mobile carriers that cannot force the CPE equipment vendors to manufacture custom-designed boxes will probably have to opt for one of the other solutions. This is primarily because of the lack of IPv6 support on low-cost DSL and mobile devices (IPv6 is an integral part of the cable industry's DOCSIS 3.0 and DOCSIS 2.0 + IPv6 standards).
With DS-Lite currently available only on a very specific subset of CPE devices and A+P not having even a proof-of-concept code, sadly LSN (either in NAT44 or NAT444 environment) seems to be the only viable option for the moment.
Ivan Pepelnjak is chief technology advisor at NIL Data Communications
This article originally appeared on SearchTelecom.com