Now if you're new to Cisco IT networking, you may not be totally sure about the EIGRPv6 protocol. I hope this article will quickly clarify things.
First of all, EIGRP stands for Enhanced Interior Gateway Routing Protocol; it's the enhanced version of the Interior Gateway Routing Protocol (IGRP) and was created by Cisco Systems. Currently, there are two versions of EIGRP; version 4 (EIGRPv4) and version 6 (EIGRPv6); EIGRPv4 runs on IPv4 networks and EIGRPv6 runs on IPv6 networks. EIGRPv6 pretty much operates in the same manner as its predecessor EIGRPv4; and both versions of EIGRP do the following:
- Allows an EIGRP router(s) to build a topology table from each of its neighbor's advertisements; and then only the best routes from the topology table are placed into the router's routing table. The best route to a particular destination is called a "successor" and the second best route to a particular destination is called a "feasible successor".
- Both versions of EIGRP, use the Diffusing Update Algorithm or (DUAL) for fast convergence and to guarantee loop-free operation.
- Both versions of EIGRP, only send routing updates about paths that have changed, once an EIGRP network has converged.
- Both versions of EIGRP, allow EIGRP router interfaces to send hello packets every 5 seconds on high bandwidth links and every 60 seconds on low bandwidth multipoint links to verify neighboring router connectivity.
- Both versions of EIGRP, rely on the metrics of Bandwidth, Delay, Reliability, and Load, to determine routes but, mainly uses Bandwidth and Delay. The entire EIGRP metric formula is:
256*((K 1*Bw) (K 2*Bw)/(256-Load) (K3*Delay)* (K 5/(Reliability K 4)))
- Also, both versions of EIGRP use the Reliable Transport Protocol (RTP) when necessary to guarantee the delivery of EIGRP packets.
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