Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Comcast Cable Modem replacement

SpittingImage said:
Understood. I need to ditch the Comcast rental modem anyway so I'll get the AC SB6121 which will more than pay for itself in a year anyway. I'll consider the other options regarding file transfer and storage.

Many thanks for taking the time to explain this, I really appreciate it.:)
Click to expand...
What do you mean by the AC SB6121. The SB6121 is just a modem and offers no wireless capability.
 
Yeah sorry, one to many TLA's crept in there. In this case a two letter acronym.

I've ordered the SB6121 from Amazon a few minutes ago.
 
Apart from giving Comcast their Cable Modem back the other part of this exercise was to have my various USB3.0 hard drives connected to the wireless router. Now in view of what you have told me the USB3.0 ports are barely faster than the USB2.0 ports. If I were able to get an Ethernet to USB3.0 adapter I could connect to an Ethernet port on a Time Capsule (3TB) to a USB3.0 Hub and have 2 or 3 of my existing 2TB hard drives permanently connected. This I think would be a relatively fast file transfer between my MacBook Pro to the drives over the WiFi. Is there such a thing as an Ethernet To USB3.0 adapter? If you Google it it shows several but they are the wrong way USB to Ethernet.

Edit. Of course it helps if you use the right terminology in your Google search. I'm finding them if I use Ethernet to USB NAS adapter.
 
Last edited:
SpittingImage said:
Apart from giving Comcast their Cable Modem back the other part of this exercise was to have my various USB3.0 hard drives connected to the wireless router. Now in view of what you have told me the USB3.0 ports are barely faster than the USB2.0 ports. If I were able to get an Ethernet to USB3.0 adapter I could connect to an Ethernet port on a Time Capsule (3TB) to a USB3.0 Hub and have 2 or 3 of my existing 2TB hard drives permanently connected. This I think would be a relatively fast file transfer between my MacBook Pro to the drives over the WiFi. Is there such a thing as an Ethernet To USB3.0 adapter? If you Google it it shows several but they are the wrong way USB to Ethernet.

Edit. Of course it helps if you use the right terminology in your Google search. I'm finding them if I use Ethernet to USB NAS adapter.
Click to expand...


There is no adapter that I know of. You can use a powered USB hub to connect the drives however, to the USB port on the AirPort.
 
SpittingImage said:
Apart from giving Comcast their Cable Modem back the other part of this exercise was to have my various USB3.0 hard drives connected to the wireless router. Now in view of what you have told me the USB3.0 ports are barely faster than the USB2.0 ports. If I were able to get an Ethernet to USB3.0 adapter I could connect to an Ethernet port on a Time Capsule (3TB) to a USB3.0 Hub and have 2 or 3 of my existing 2TB hard drives permanently connected. This I think would be a relatively fast file transfer between my MacBook Pro to the drives over the WiFi. Is there such a thing as an Ethernet To USB3.0 adapter? If you Google it it shows several but they are the wrong way USB to Ethernet.

Edit. Of course it helps if you use the right terminology in your Google search. I'm finding them if I use Ethernet to USB NAS adapter.
Click to expand...

No such thing. What you are talking about is a NAS device. If you want top speeds to a networked drive, you will need to spring for a NAS device of some sort. Any USB drive hung off the back of a router is going to be somewhat slower. Although some of the better routers like that Netgear R7000 mentioned on the chart above have pretty good file copy speeds.

Those Ethernet to USB NAS adapter gadgets you are seeing are essentially a really cheap NAS device that uses external USB hard drives rather than an internal drive. I think you will find the performance of all those is pretty poor and you may as well just go with a router that can run a USB drive off the back.

If you read over the review of that router it does not seem to have the USB3 problem the Asus did. Maybe better USB cable shielding inside the router.
 
http://www.addonics.com/products/nas30u2.php

I think this is one of the cheap devices you're talking about. The thing is I have several USB 3.0 External drives that I would like to use if possible. I currently have 3 of them attached to my MacBook via a powered USB3.0 hub. I want to free it of all the external devices.
 
SpittingImage said:
http://www.addonics.com/products/nas30u2.php

I think this is one of the cheap devices you're talking about. The thing is I have several USB 3.0 External drives that I would like to use if possible. I currently have 3 of them attached to my MacBook via a powered USB3.0 hub. I want to free it of all the external devices.
Click to expand...

Yeah... that is what I was talking about. The PC Mag review says they got 15MB/s transfer speeds, so only a little better than what you have now and not close to as good as the Netgear R7000. The Amazon reviews on that Addonics thingy are pretty rough. :eek:

How about trying it out with the powered hub and those drives attached to your existing router, then if that is not cutting it for you... maybe move up to that Netgear R7000 later. If seems to have great disk transfer speeds.

The issue with all these gadgets is it requires some raw CPU power to get these good transfer speeds, and cheap NAS gadgets like that just are not going to have the power to handle it.
 
Weaselboy said:
Yeah... that is what I was talking about. The PC Mag review says they got 15MB/s transfer speeds, so only a little better than what you have now and not close to as good as the Netgear R7000. The Amazon reviews on that Addonics thingy are pretty rough. :eek:

How about trying it out with the powered hub and those drives attached to your existing router, then if that is not cutting it for you... maybe move up to that Netgear R7000 later. If seems to have great disk transfer speeds.

The issue with all these gadgets is it requires some raw CPU power to get these good transfer speeds, and cheap NAS gadgets like that just are not going to have the power to handle it.
Click to expand...

That sounds like a good plan. The Netgear R7000 does look impressive though.

Thanks for taking the time to enlighten me:)
 
SpittingImage said:
http://www.addonics.com/products/nas30u2.php

I think this is one of the cheap devices you're talking about. The thing is I have several USB 3.0 External drives that I would like to use if possible. I currently have 3 of them attached to my MacBook via a powered USB3.0 hub. I want to free it of all the external devices.
Click to expand...

A couple of comments about that product. First, it's slow as in no faster than any other NAS as its ports are USB 2. Next, Addonics has superseded that hub with a newer unit (http://www.addonics.com/products/nas40esu.php) but it's still "slow" as in it's ports are still USB 2, although it does have eSATAp ports (I've got a couple of cheap eSATA-USB3 converters I picked up at Fry's for $15 each for my old G-Tech RAID boxes).

Regarding interference, read this link at PC Mag on this subject (I've got it bookmarked, and it's informative for noobs like me): http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2423604,00.asp

Intel hasn't been pushing wireless USB 3 AFAIK. Sad, that. I'm looking to free my offices from wire clutter, and I'd buy an AC router with 2-3 USB 3 ports as I can't find any NAS hubs that are faster than me getting off my can and attaching a DAS... Need speed, getting old fast...
 
OP, and others, regarding my comments on the SB6141, I'm still not happy with the units we use on Comcast. I have been following a couple of threads on DSLReports.com that Comcast is testing a new FW to address complaints (timeouts, freezing, slow speeds, random reboots, etc.). I hope that the new FW is better than the version current installed in my units.

One thing I hadn't shared was that Comcast actually paid for my SB6141 units by reimbursing me, and I'm not paying a modem lease fee. So, that I'm still not happy with "free" cable modems should be a warning to Comcast subs. The current FWs in my units are the SB_KOMODO-1.0.6.10-SCM00-NOSH from 10/12 (which AFAIK is the same FW deployed on Comcast's SB6121).

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r29437035-Speed-Speed-Issues-with-SB1641~start=30
http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r29504418-SB6141-rebooting-every-6-hours
 
Get a Motorola and be ready to every 2-3 month be charged for a rental fee...Comcast plays the game of charging its customers a rental fee for the customers own modem, therefore customers that don't pay attention get charged, and when you call to customer service they document a customer request to adjust the service therefore whatever service conditions they gave you are no longer 'active' but whatever the service rep puts in the system to adjust or update your services based on a 'customer request'.
I have been stuck with that vicious cycle and unfortunately there are very limited choices in my area. Look forward for competitors to beat comcast...
 
McGiord said:
Get a Motorola and be ready to every 2-3 month be charged for a rental fee...Comcast plays the game of charging its customers a rental fee for the customers own modem, therefore customers that don't pay attention get charged, and when you call to customer service they document a customer request to adjust the service therefore whatever service conditions they gave you are no longer 'active' but whatever the service rep puts in the system to adjust or update your services based on a 'customer request'.
I have been stuck with that vicious cycle and unfortunately there are very limited choices in my area. Look forward for competitors to beat comcast...
Click to expand...


Thanks, I'll look out for that.

----------

I want to thanks everyone for the suggestions to my questions.

I purchased a Motorola SB6121 and got it working with my existing Netgear N900. As expected no change on the Speakeasy test, around 28 Mbps. I went out and purchased and connected an Airport Time Capsule and a couple of minutes later I ran a Speakeasy text and got 30 Mbps. A few minutes later I got 29Mbps but by that time the backup was underway. Nice little unit, very clean lines and with the SB6121 they take up very little shelf room.

Thanks again for the great advice.
 
SpittingImage said:
Thanks, I'll look out for that.

----------

I want to thanks everyone for the suggestions to my questions.

I purchased a Motorola SB6121 and got it working with my existing Netgear N900. As expected no change on the Speakeasy test, around 28 Mbps. I went out and purchased and connected an Airport Time Capsule and a couple of minutes later I ran a Speakeasy text and got 30 Mbps. A few minutes later I got 29Mbps but by that time the backup was underway. Nice little unit, very clean lines and with the SB6121 they take up very little shelf room.

Thanks again for the great advice.
Click to expand...

Glad you are happy with your new modem! Here is a tip, bookmark 192.168.100.1. It is the modem's configuration panel which shows signal, uptime, and other great information. You can even reboot it from there.
 
Altemose said:
Glad you are happy with your new modem! Here is a tip, bookmark 192.168.100.1. It is the modem's configuration panel which shows signal, uptime, and other great information. You can even reboot it from there.
Click to expand...

It's nice and small compared to the old one. Is there a facility for a battery by any chance?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back