Equipment Concern (Wifi)

Yes, they are likely sending a Cisco BWG since they seem to like using that model a lot.  It has ethernet ports as well as the wifi ports.  Do you have a static IP address?  Because if you don't you can use any over-the-counter cable modem from Netgear, Linksys, Motorola, etc. and get out of paying the $15 a month for equipment.

The thing you should know is that the wifi cannot be turned off on these units so if you have other wifi in the area it will consume wifi bandwidth even if you don't use it.   Placing the unit in a Faraday cage will solve the problem.  While Comcast will advise you to just call them and have them turn off the wifi the fact is every time the modem gets reset it will turn the wifi back on again.

None of the other modems Cisco hands out to business customers has enough CPU power to handle 250MB

seconds part to my last inquiry....

If I currently have a SMCD36 cable modem which supports 10/100/1000 Mbps, then couldnt i just use it for speeds up to 250 Mbps rather than have them come and give me a new modem.  I dont think I want to utilize the wifi at all, so couldnt I use my current modem?

Hello xodus2222,

My apologies on how long it has taken to respond to this post. To respond to your inquiries

1) yes you can use the Wifi and Ethernet at the same time. What tmittelstaedt is referring to is the Xfinity Wifi Hot-Spot. The public Wifi, though can be turned off by Comcast Staff, will return upon reboot. Though I cannot speak to the usage of Farday caging on the equipment, I can confirm that once a wireless device connects to this public hot spot it will take away from your modems bandwidth. For this reason we place a 5 device limit per modem on connecting to the Xfinity Hot-spot. Once this feature is turned off it does NOT disable the private Wifi on your modem. This you would have access to make changes on.

2) The supported speeds of 10/100/1000 Mbps are referring to the Ethernet connections and their potential speeds. The main connection to the modem would still require a different device to properly service the 250Mbps. Again as stated with the last answer you have the option to disable the private wifi on your own.

Please let me know if you have any other questions.

Thanks for the information

The technician came and installed the gateway.  I asked him about disabling the xfinity hot spot, like you suggestions and he told me he could not.  He said that wifi was all in air and if though I would have a private network the xfinity hot spot could not be turned off.  Was he wrong?

He was primarily correct in what he told you. The only exception is that internal Comcast support can turn the Xfinity signal off. Upon reboot the signal will turn back on but it will broadcast side-by-side with your private wifi signal. Please let me know if you have any other questions.

Thank you,

I did disable the Xfinity wifi for you already. With the speed drop do you recall the that this occurred?

It happened around 7:30 ish PM and stayed that way to almost midnight.  Now, last night, so far, the speed drop was minimal.  I am hoping that the stopping of the hotspot helped.  I will keep an eye on it though. 

Thank you,

I was looking over the logs and did a signal "hiccup" if you will but not much to trace with it. As a result I would like to put your modem in a temporary IPv4 only mode to force re-registration to the network. I have found that this helps resolve a lot of customers connection issues. As a warning this rest can take up to 40 minutes to complete, though it usually does not take that long. Is this an option you would like to explore, if so what time do you prefer (AM|PM)?

Let me monitor it some more.  I am hoping that everything worked itself out.  I will let you know.  Thanks again.

There was sort of a reset yesterday and I think the hotspot thing came back on.  Can you please turn it off once more.  Thanks.