If history is any guide the last Cisco boxes I worked on supported various flavors of SDLC and pre-SNA IBM comm, DECnet and DECnet LAT, IPX, Burroughs, poll select and the only protocol they do not still support is CorvisNet on twisted pair. Some of these protocols have not seen the light of day since when?
What is a Good CCIE test without arcane SDLC, HDLC and DECnet protocol questions.
Most SOHO routers use standard or proprietary silicon to do the IP stack or IP route assist and when the silicon is available for dual stack in quantity 10,000 units or more at a reasonable price the SOHO routers will support both.
IMHO before Linksys was owned by Cisco, I liked Netgear because there code was from Bay networks and had better routing. Finally, when I bought the expensive $ 150.00 routers with integral VPN support that was neat.
What I would like to see today is SOHO routers that do not interfere with 6 over 4 transport since my ISP does not offer home DSL termination of v6. Taking the silicon in a SOHO and adding 5 to 10 $ US in cost for v6 and multiple that by 5 to get a retail price of those features. Then offset that with the decrease in silicon size when you add both together with smaller size lines and transistors on the chips, I would project SOHO prices of 250 - 350 $ US to start with for v4 & v6 and dropping from there.
Slightly off-topic, but tangentially related that I'll dare to ask.
I'm attending an "Emerging Communications" course where the instructor
stated that there are SOHO routers that natively support IPv6, pointing to
Asia specifically.
Do Linksys, D-Link, Netgear, etc. have such software for the Asian markets?
Furthermore, he stated that networking equipment companies like Cisco will
be moving away from IPv4 in 5 years or so. This is the first time I've
heard this posited -- I had a hard believing that, but he claims it with
some authority. Anyone hear anything like this? My own opinion is that
we'll see dual-stack for at least a decade or two to come.
Frank