If you want to install networking on a computer, you must install TCP/IP
networking and a network adapter. Windows 8 uses TCP/IP as the default
wide area network (WAN) protocol. Networking components are normally
installed during Windows 8 installation. You can also install TCP/IP
networking through the network connection Properties dialog box.
Working with TCP/IP and the Dual IP Stack
The TCP and IP protocols enable computers to communicate across
various networks and the Internet by using network adapters, whether
network interface cards, USB-attachable network adapters, PC Card
network adapters, or built-in adapters on the motherboard. Windows 8 has
a dual IP-layer architecture in which both Internet Protocol version 4
(IPv4) and Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) are implemented and share
common Transport and Frame layers.
IPv4 and IPv6 are used in very different ways. IPv4 has 32-bit
addresses and is the primary version of IP used on most networks,
including the Internet. IPv6 has 128-bit addresses and is the next
generation of IP.
IPv4’s 32-bit addresses commonly are expressed as four separate
decimal values, such as 127.0.0.1 or 192.168.1.20. The four decimal
values are referred to as octets because each represents 8 bits of the 32-bit number. With standard unicast IPv4 addresses, a variable part of the IP address
represents the network ID and another variable part represents the host
ID. There is no correlation between a host’s IPv4 address and the
internal machine (MAC) address used by the host’s network adapter.
IPv6’s 128-bit addresses are divided into eight 16-bit blocks
delimited by colons. Each 16-bit block is expressed in hexadecimal form.
With standard unicast IPv6 addresses, the first 64 bits represent the
network ID and the last 64 bits represent the network interface. Here is
an example of an IPv6 address:
FEC0:0:0:02BC:FF:BECB:FE4F:961D
Because many IPv6 address blocks are set to 0, a contiguous set of 0
blocks can be expressed as “::”, a notation referred to as the double-colon notation. Using double-colon notation, the two 0 blocks in the previous address are compressed as follows:
FEC0::02BC:FF:BECB:FE4F:961D
If three or more 0 blocks are included, they would be compressed in
the same way. For example, FFE8:0:0:0:0:0:0:1 becomes FFE8::1.
When networking hardware is detected during installation of the
operating system, both IPv4 and IPv6 are enabled by default, and there
is no need to install a separate component to enable support for IPv6.
The modified IP architecture in Windows 8 is referred to as the Dual TCP/IP stack. Table 1 summarizes the key TCP/IP features implemented in the Dual TCP/IP stack. Table 2 summarizes the key Dual TCP/IP stack features that are specific to IPv6.
Table 1. Key TCP/IP Features in the Dual TCP/IP Stack
FEATURES SUPPORTED |
DESCRIPTION |
---|
Automatic Black Hole Router Detection |
Prevents TCP connections from terminating due to intermediate routers
silently discarding large TCP segments, retransmissions, or error
messages. |
Automatic Dead Gateway Retry |
Ensures that an unreachable gateway is checked periodically to determine whether it has become available. |
Compound TCP |
Optimizes TCP transfers for the sending host by increasing the amount
of data sent in a connection while ensuring that other TCP connections
are not affected. |
Extended Selective Acknowledgments |
Extends the way Selective Acknowledgments (SACKs) are used, enabling a
receiver to indicate up to four noncontiguous blocks of received data
and to acknowledge duplicate packets. This helps the receiver determine
when it has retransmitted a segment unnecessarily and adjust its
behavior to prevent future retransmissions. |
Modified Fast Recovery Algorithm |
Provides faster throughput by altering the way that a sender can
increase the sending rate if multiple segments in a window of data are
lost and the sender receives an acknowledgment stating that only part of
the data has been successfully received. |
Neighbor Unreachability Detection for IPv4 |
Determines when neighboring nodes and routers are no longer reachable and reports the condition. |
Network Diagnostics Framework |
Provides an extensible framework that helps users recover from and troubleshoot problems with network connections. |
Receive Window Auto Tuning |
Optimizes TCP transfers for the host receiving data by automatically
managing the size of the memory buffer (the receive window) to use for
storing incoming data based on the current network conditions. |
Routing Compartments |
Prevents unwanted forwarding of traffic between interfaces by
associating an interface or a set of interfaces with a logon session
that has its own routing tables. |
SACK-Based Loss Recovery |
Makes it possible to use SACK information to perform loss recovery
when duplicate acknowledgments have been received and to recover more
quickly when multiple segments are not received at the destination. |
Spurious Retransmission Timeout Detection |
Provides correction for sudden, temporary increases in retransmission
timeouts and prevents unnecessary retransmission of segments. |
TCP Extended Statistics |
Helps determine whether a performance bottleneck for a connection is
the sending application, the receiving application, or the network. |
Windows Filtering Platform |
Provides application programming interfaces (APIs) for extending the TCP/IP filtering architecture so that it can support additional features. |
Table 2. Key Dual TCP/IP Stack Features for IPv6
Feature Supported |
Description |
---|
DHCPv6-Capable DHCP Client |
Extends the DHCP client to support IPv6, and allows stateful address autoconfiguration with a DHCPv6 server. |
IP Security |
Allows use of Internet Key Exchange (IKE) and data encryption for IPv6. |
IPv6 over Point-to-Point Protocol (PPPv6) |
Allows native IPv6 traffic to be sent over PPP-based connections,
which in turn allows remote access clients to connect with an IPv6-based
Internet service provider (ISP) through dial-up or PPP over Ethernet
(PPPoE)–based connections. |
Link-Local Multicast Name Resolution (LLMNR) |
Allows IPv6 hosts on a single subnet without a DNS server to resolve each other’s names. |
Multicast Listener Discovery version 2 (MLDv2) |
Provides support for source-specific multicast traffic and is
equivalent to Internet Group Management Protocol version 3 (IGMPv3) for
IPv4. |
Random Interface IDs |
Prevents scanning of IPv6 addresses based on the known company IDs of
network adapter manufacturers. By default, Windows 8 generates random
interface IDs for nontemporary, autoconfigured IPv6 addresses, including
public and link-local addresses. |
Symmetric Network Address Translators |
Maps the internal (private) address and port number to different
external (public) addresses and ports, depending on the external
destination address. |
Installing Network Adapters
Network adapters are hardware devices that are used to communicate on
networks. You can install and configure network adapters by completing
the following steps:
-
Follow the manufacturer’s instructions. For example, you might need
to use the software provided by the manufacturer to modify the Interrupt
setting or the Port setting of the adapter. -
If installing an internal network
interface card, shut down the computer, unplug it, and install the
adapter card in the appropriate slot on the computer. When you’ve
finished, plug in and start the computer. -
Windows 8 should detect the new adapter during startup. If you have a
separate driver disc for the adapter, you should insert it now.
Otherwise, you might be prompted to insert a driver disc. -
If Windows 8 doesn’t detect the adapter automatically. -
If networking services aren’t installed on the system, install them as described in the next section.
Installing Networking Services (TCP/IP)
If you’re installing TCP/IP after installing Windows 8, log on to the
computer using an account with administrator privileges, and then
follow these steps:
-
In Control Panel, tap or click Network And Internet, and then tap or click Network And Sharing Center. -
In Network And Sharing Center, under View Your Active Networks, tap or click the link for the network connection.
Tip
If the network connection you want to work with isn’t active, tap or
click Connect To A Network. In Network Connections, press and hold or
right-click the connection you want to work with, and then tap or click
Properties.
-
In the Status dialog box, tap or click Properties. This displays a
Properties dialog box for the connection with the Networking tab
selected, as shown in Figure 1.
-
If Internet Protocol Version 6 (TCP/IPv6), Internet Protocol Version 4
(TCP/IPv4), or both aren’t shown in the list of installed components,
you need to install them. Tap or click Install, tap or click Protocol,
and then tap or click Add. In the Select Network Protocol dialog box,
select the protocol to install, and then tap or click OK. To install
both TCP/IPv6 and TCP/IPv4, repeat this step. -
In the Properties dialog box for the network connection, make sure
that the following are selected, as appropriate: Internet Protocol
Version 6 (TCP/IPv6), Internet Protocol Version 4 (TCP/IPv4), or both.
Tap or click OK. -
As necessary, follow the instructions in the next section for configuring network connections for the computer.
|