Don't rent a cable modem

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8Muddypaws

8Muddypaws

Well-known member
Joined
Jul 18, 2014
Posts
4,073
Location
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If you're paying a monthly fee for a cable modem you're being ripped off.

http://www.amazon.com/Linksys-Advanced-DOCSIS-Cable-DPC3008/dp/B006IJHK96?tag=cnet-viglink-20

These work extremely well.  Best price I've seen.
 
I've considered that numerous times, but our cable company is also our phone company...and have to have a telephony modem that will work with their system.
(unfortunately, we live in an area that gets horrendous cell service, so dumping the landline isn't a good option for us)
 
Back in the day when I had Comcast, I used my own modem with no problem. They just requested a few numbers off the unit to get it into their system. Old Surfboard if I remember correctly.
 
BoomerD said:
I've considered that numerous times, but our cable company is also our phone company...and have to have a telephony modem that will work with their system.
(unfortunately, we live in an area that gets horrendous cell service, so dumping the landline isn't a good option for us)
Click to expand...
Internet and phone use the same modem? I've only seen them separate, and the phone modem is included with the phone service.
 
I had Comcast voice for a few months.  It started out at $20 a month.  Then they doubled it.  Then they raised it to $50.  At that point I switched to Ooma.  It took 2 days for them to port my number and it was worth the wait. 

It costs $99 initially for the hardware and $5 a month since then.  The box lives behind my firewall and works flawlessly.

So buying my own modem saved me about $10 a month and raised my internet speed. (Went from 30 to 176 Mbps), and Ooma saves me $45 a month.  That's money I can spend on RV stuff, guitar strings, and ammunition for target shooting.


 
Good advice here! 

Renting a modem from your cable company is expensive.  I bought a DOCSIS 3 modem and an Ooma phone a few years ago.  It's probably saved me ~$1000 since then.

 
Don't you need reliable internet for Ooma to work?

We have Wave Broadband for cable/telephone and they're the most UN-dependable provider we've ever had. I have had more outages in the 2-1/2 years we've lived here than I've had in more than 20 years of being on the internet...COMBINED. At least twice per month...sometimes a couple of times per week, phone and internet are out. Of course, call them and "oh, let's reboot your modem!" and it doesn't matter that I've done that at least once before I call...and it almost never works because after the script monkeys have me do that..."Oh, gee...looks like there's a system-wide outage in your neighborhood. No estimated time for repair."  ::)

If I had ANY viable option other than Wave...I'd jump on it...but I don't. (other than Dishnet...which is expensive, has low data caps, and isn't very reliable here)
 
Yes, it needs a reliable connection.  But it doesn't have to be all that fast.  Ooma uses about 512Kbps.

On the positive side, any calls receive during an outage will go directly to your voice mail.
 
I have had my own modem previously but when we switched from Dish back to cable I took their offer of a modem with built in wi-fi. Works great for $10 month and they have replaced it once already when the wi-fi went bad.
 
I have purchased both a DSL and a Cable modem locally off Craigslist for 20-25 bucks. These were the exact units  Cox and our phone system used.
 
8Muddypaws said:
Yes, it needs a reliable connection.  But it doesn't have to be all that fast.  Ooma uses about 512Kbps.

On the positive side, any calls receive during an outage will go directly to your voice mail.
Click to expand...
I would be shocked.... SHOCKED ! If your VOIP was anywhere remotely close to 500k. Its likely 50k, and even thats WAY more than needed for telco standard voice.
 
8Muddypaws said:
If you're paying a monthly fee for a cable modem you're being ripped off.
Click to expand...
Some ISP's do not allow you to buy your own cable modem.

I own a few homes. I have internet at each. The one here in SSF is Comcast, and I purchased my own Harris modem (does both, telephone and internet) and router.

At my home in Reno and in Cold Springs Valley, NV, I have Charter. They no longer allow subscribers to use their own  cable modems on their systems. They claim that such have caused problems when they update their services and such.

They do NOT charge a rental fee for their cable modem (yeah, sure, they just raise the bill to cover it for all).

-Don-  SSF, CA
 
We had Time Warner's phone and Internet service using their modem for awhile, but when the rate kept going up, I first bought an ObiHai ATA (Analog Telephone Adapter) that can use many different VOIP services, including the free Google Voice. I selected Phone Power as our primary provider at a cost of $35/year with all of the usual features, and Google Voice as our secondary service. Phone Power has worked very well for us, and in the event of an outage, calls automatically forward to our cell phones, as they do if we don't answer within a user selected time delay. We can also make calls via WiFi from our cell phones using a Phone Power app. About a year after we dropped TWC's phone service, they raised the modem lease rate to $10/month, and I bought a refurbished Arris (formerly Motorola) DOC 3 modem/router/WiFi AP on Amazon for $70. That too has worked well for us.
 
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