Re: athome funny business [was Slow Cable Modem Revisited]
On Fri, May 04, 2001 at 12:23:31PM -0500, Nathan E Norman wrote:
> On Fri, May 04, 2001 at 09:04:57AM -0700, idalton@ferret.phonewave.net wrote:
> > On Fri, May 04, 2001 at 11:21:12AM -0400, Jaldhar H. Vyas wrote:
> > > Suddenly it occurred to me that the slowdown I'd started seeing with my
> > > @home service began occurring right arounf the time I took my LinkSys
> > > Etherlink II card (uses ne2k-pci driver) out and replaced it with a D-Link
> > > DFE-530TX+ (uses rtl8139 driver.) So I put it back in and lo and behold!
> > > my connection is zipping along again.
> > >
> > > I still think @home are up to some funny business but for now I'm happy.
> >
> > Hehe. Speaking of funny business, I just had @home set up, and the cable
> > installer never left me a modem manual, and 3com is <sarcasm>being their
> > usually helpful self again</sarcasm> about offering content obscured in
> > javascript.[0]
> >
> > So I emailed support to ask for a user manual. I'm sent back an
> > 'individual' boilerplate response suggesting I power-cycle the modem and
> > reboot my computer. Yeaaaah...
>
> What exactly are you hoping to accomplish by acquiring a user manual
> for your cable modem?
>
> Cable modems are completely unlike DSL modems regarding "user-tunable"
> bits. For better or for worse, most of the cable modem's
> functionality is meant to be controlled by the cable operator.
Let's see.. There are status lights marked with incomprehensable
symbols. I think I've puzzled three of them out, but the fourth remains
unlit and I have no idea what it means. I also want to turn off the LOUD
chiming sound it makes when it syncs to the cable. The installer guy
said it was a user-settable option.
> BTW, I don't believe @Home is forcing anyone to use a proxy (though
> they like it if you do; it lowers their aggregate demand for external
> bandwidth.) IMO, most "funny business" with @Home is a result of
> their rapid growth. Besides, @Home has to depend on the local cable
> operator to uphold quality considerations for the last mile.
I like using a proxy too. Heck, I HAVE to run a proxy on my firewall box
for my internal machines. And I like the idea of keeping external
aggregate bandwidth down. Hopefully it'll help keep me off their
'naughty' list for daring to have mail-transport-agent and ssh-server
installed so I can actually USE my computer. ;)
-- Ferret
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