Hands off DSL modem

Cisco routers can have uptimes of many many years without touching them. You pay for this feature though, but if uptime is worth money..

I've had good luck with long uptimes on Netopia too, but they aren't very strong in the router market.

Otherwise, the sub-$150 range of routers generally don't have that as a design concern.

The ONLY times I've had to reboot DSL modems in years is after a storm. Some times. Rarely.

Your ISP needs to give you better gear.

I am/have supported various flavors over the years, but always what the ISP gave me. But it IS the same ISP. A local firm that I get along with really really well.

I don't know anyone who has to cycle their modems (not modem+router). Mine is 3 or more years old, a BroadMax Technology that my isp supplied that has only been off for a few power failures. It just keeps on working, now at 6Mb/s.

I've had a Westell modem (probably a 2100 -- dunno the exact number off-hand) go for at least a year -- long enough that they get "naturally" power cycled by the occasional power outage!

I would love to see a list of modems that are known to be relatively "bomb proof" in this regard. I believe that even a lot of home users are willing to pay, say, $200 vs. $100 for a modem if they know they can run whatever they want to through it and it'll just keep on ticking.

---Joel Kolstad

You have GOT to be kidding. Go out and try and sell anything in the real world. Most people look at price, then price, then price, then price, then maybe maybe maybe consider other factors. "Uncle Bill doesn't have to power cycle his, mine should be ok too."

Hi DLR,

Sure, I'm just saying a list would be useful in that there *is* a market there. In the PC world, 1/10 of 1% is still hundreds of thousands to millions of sales -- quite respectable.

Part of my conviction is based on looking at all those people who willingly drop $500 on the latest video card just to go from, e.g., 45 to 60 FPS in 3D games...

---Joel

Doug,

Actually the one I installed is a Netopia 3347N. The DSL modem part obviously works, and the router component is fairly powerful. The only thing I don't like it that every change you do, including let's say, adding a pinhole/port forward, requires a restart. But once you've configured it, watch it run!

For a $150 product, I could not possibly be happier.

Doug Mc> >Has anybody installed and used an ADSL modem that didn't need to be

DLR,

Thanks for the input. Yes, I agree we shouldn't be using gear that needs to be restarted for no obvious reason. That said, you can bet your butt they're looking at the price of this hardware.

You know that it's especially true when you call their support line and before being transferred you hear a recording like "Did you know that most internet problems can be solved by simply restarting your DSL modem?" and then the best part, "For help restarting your DSL modem, go to

DLR wrote:

Now you know someone. There's a model that is used extensively in our area, the Speedstream 5260. For whatever reason, I seem to be restarting this model way more than I should. For awhile my attitude was that there are problems with ADSL technology and not the demarc/CPE. Even when I've got this model on a battery backup (as well as the router) it seems to need a restart every other month. The Speedstream 4060 (USB) is worse yet, but for what it's worth the Speedstream 5100 seems to never need a restart.

Rob wrote:

These are both good points. My philosophy is that if it isn't "self-healing" when it could be, then it's the wrong product for any customer you care about, no matter how cheap it is.

Joel Kolstad wrote:

I have a Speedstream 5100A (modem only, 4 lights) and the last time it was power cycled was 3 years ago, that was the last time I had a power failure.