The [OC]Mod Blog

 

Just because the DOCSIS standard says XYZ doesn’t mean that the PHYSICAL HARDWARE in the modems isn’t designed for much higher speeds. The limiting factor on cable modem speed has been, to date, the network, not the modem technology. It’s trivial to push very high speeds for long distances over coax, thicknet did it forever and then thinnet at 10 Mpbs after that in the 80’s. There’s even a 100 Mbps thicknet available though it was never very widly used or adopted - 100 Mbps over UTP was quickly recognized as cheaper especially since it was released before the 100 Mbps thicknet, although you can still find some 100 Mbps thicknet in older token ring installations made in about a 2 month period around 1990 (before STP took over there). IBM’s mainframe mentality was still prevelant at the time and that’s why it was even made. The new silicon in cable modems is far more advanced than what was used in previous coax installations - the hardware itself is capable of far more than the software or network.

Oh yeah, side note, this could be frying them too: in the users guide you’re to put the modem on the first split from the main cable line going into your house, and since many if not most houses now have some manner of structured wiring (explanation for another day) that would mean placing it at the wiring panel or near it, and not many people do that, they just throw it wherever. The more splitting it goes through the more power is necessary inside the modem to a) amplify the signal so that the chip can use it (only on some better modems, some don’t do any of this) and definitely b) to send upstream data back, since virtually all modems have adjustable power coming out of them to get the signal out to the street so they don’t use more than they have to.