ARRIS - SURFboard 32 x 8 DOCSIS 3.0 Cable Modem - White

My goal was simple... to escape the cable company's Modem Rental Fee of $10 per month. So, I thought, I'll pick up a $25 modem and be the hero. But, after doing a little research, I learned that modems may have a bigger part to play in the health and performance of my home network than I had thought. I didn't even know that different models performed at different speeds and had different capabilities. So I asked my BB associate, which was the fastest he had in stock, and on that particular day, it was the ARRIS - SURFboard DOCSIS 3.0 Cable Modem. I found that it cost much less than a year's rental for the cable company's modem, and it was substantially faster than it as well, which I hoped would help with all the streaming we seem to do these days. The Result... it helped enough with the media streaming that it allowed me to reduce my Internet Plan from 155 Mbps to 50 Mbps (Saving me $10 per month), with no noticeable loss in streaming performance, and only a negligible difference with Internet Surfing which most people would not notice. So, my ARRIS - SURFboard DOCSIS 3.0 Cable Modem, is now saving me $10 a month in modem rental fees from the cable company, and is so fast, that it saved me another $10 on my Internet plan (50 Mbps vs 155 Mbps). This means that in less than 5 mos my Arris will pay for itself, then after that it will be saving me $20 a month, and I haven't given anything up to do it (except the cable company's modem). On top of that, the Arris saved me from spending $300+ to upgrade my 3 year-old router which I thought was the bottleneck in our home's streaming performance, but wasn't. AND, as an added Bonus, when I switched to the ARRIS - SURFboard DOCSIS 3.0 Cable Modem, my all-in-one printer stopped loosing its network connection, which was a daily occurrence with the cable company's modem, and an incredible nuisance which wouldn't allow me to print or scan anymore. So, if you want to put money in your pocket, and stream, scan and print more reliably, replace your cable company rental with an ARRIS - SURFboard DOCSIS 3.0 Cable Modem.

I have used an Arris SB 6121 cable modem for 5 years and it served me well. Recently, Comcast dropped support for that modem so I decided to upgrade and buy this one. Yes, my SB 6121 still works, but if you have a problem with your service and call 1-800-Comcast, they will blame the modem (they know which modem you have) irrespective of what the real issue is. Why risk arguing with Comcast--rarely do you ever win! Five years is an acceptable life span for a device like a modem, so I bought the SB 6190 at Best Buy in Lombard, IL, and used the Amazon pricing for a price match. The process at the store for price matching and checking out was outstanding. I was in and out of the store in 10 minutes. When testing my internet connection on DSLreports, my SB 6121 modem got terrible bufferbloat ratings, C- or a D, whereas the SB 6190 typically gets an "A" rating. The speed achieved and quality ratings are about the same -- (download 70 Mbps, upload 10 Mbps) which is the agreed upon speed I have with Comcast and both modems get an A for quality. It appears the latency issue on the SB 6190 is much better, hence the bufferbloat improved rating. Some reviewers complain that the SB 6190 runs hot--my experience is that it runs a bit warm, but no warmer than my SB 6121. The SB 6190 has a maximum speed rating of 1.4 Gbps so if I decide to upgrade my Comcast service from my current 70 Mbps, it should work. Some people like to have their modem include a WiFi router. I believe that is a bad idea and here is why. The technologies are not the same, have evolved differently over the years and will continue to change separately in the future. For example, the latest WiFi standard is 802.11ac, however, a newer technology is due within the next year, specifically 802.11ax. Continuing on the modem side of this thought, my new SB 6190 modem has DOC 3.0 capability but a newer and improved technology, DOC 3.1 is coming shortly. I am hopeful a firmware update on my SB 6190 will be possible but who knows? In short, keep your modem purchase separate from your router! You will be doing yourself a BIG favor.

I've used Arris modems, and their Motorola predecessors for 10 years now, so when I needed a new one, I didn't hesitate to select another Arris. The store rep suggested the lower-priced model for my 75MB Comcast access; I should have listened to him. I decided to buy up one step to the SB-6190, perhaps to "future-proof" my investment a bit. A couple of months later, I've replaced it with a TP-Link TC7650. It turns out that the SB-6190 has the Intel PUMA 6 chipset, which has a known issue of slowing down Internet speed, requiring reboots at least once a day to "refresh" the device (which is essentially a small computer). My SB-6190 has the latest firmware update, which supposedly fixes the issue, but it didn't. If someone subscribes to lower speeds, the problem wouldn't occur, or they'd never notice it, but the whole point of the SB-6190 is all the extra channels for optimizing higher speeds, so if it can't reliably support higher speeds, it's useless to me. Other Arris models are fine; none uses the PUMA 6 except SB-6190. Avoid it! Or look at Zoom, TP-Link, maybe Netgear. Look for a Broadcom chipset. The TP-Link is really nice, and doesn't have the glaringly large, bright LEDs of the Arris, so it's less obtrusive anyway. I requested that Comcast remove the SB-6190 from their list of supported modems; the tech I spoke to agreed and said he personally has the same unit and the same issues, and that they receive many customer calls to troubleshoot this issue, which is basically unfixable. You've been warned...

This is a top of the line cable modem only (with 32 download bonding channel and 8 upload bonding channel) that could easily satisfy a 300Mbps download / 20Mbps upload or more (Ultimate 300 Plan that I have). I just replaced my Arris SB6183 DOCSIS 3.0 (with 16 download bonding channel and 4 upload bonding channel) with this one, due to the fact that during peaks hours, usually between 5:00 pm to 11:30 pm, on the SB6183, I could only achieved 100 to 150Mbps download and about 10Mbps upload speed. While this ARRIS SB6190 DOCSIS 3.0, at least giving me 200Mbps download and 20+Mbps upload during that peak hours mentioned. Pros: Still super fast download/upload speeds considering peak hours involved. Cons: Still pricey. Time Warner Cable still utilizes 16 download bonding channel and 4 upload bonding channel which is the same as my old SB6183, while other cable companies utilizes at least 24 download bonding channel and 8 upload bonding channel to at least sustained download/upload speeds even at peak hours. NOTES: Time Warner Cable seems to IGNORE the fact that during those peak hours mentioned, a wide area of services experiencing downturn, which means they should have been doing something on their back-end to resolve this issue; however, support phone calls being done are/were fruitless as most of the time were from outsourced sites which mostly giving instructions to reboot the cable modem with no improvement of the issue whatsoever.

We needed to update our customer owned Motorola SB5100 DOCSIS 2.0 (YES, IT IS ANCIENT!) cable modem. It has worked flawlessly for 13 years and saved us a bundle on rental fees. Naturally after experience such good service from the SurfBoard modem, we sought to purchase another Motorola product and learned that the brand was purchased by Arris. After much research, we picked the SB6190 thinking we would be future proofed for many years. Although the reviews for this modem were overwhelmingly positive, unfortunately it didn't work with our service provider. Best Buy was awesome in allowing us to return/exchange this modem when the ISPs customer service rep thought it to be defective. The second SB6190 also failed to provision. This prompted a call to Arris. Their customer service rep was excellent and knowledgeable about the product. According to Arris Technical support, the SB6190 modem requires a 45-52 dBmV power level to lock on to the upstream signal. The measured upload signal at our house was 39.5-40 (as indicated by our sb5100 status page). At this point, we were beyond the capability of telephone support and scheduled for a service visit. After about two hours of troubleshooting by the cable technician and fixing some minor problems, the signal improved slightly, but was still not enough for the SB6190 modem to "provision" and lock-on to the upstream signal. I asked the cable installer to assist in troubleshooting by installing one the of the ISPs modem units which happened to be a Motorola 6580 modem - wireless router combo unit. It instantly locked onto the signal and provided the expected performance. After reinstalling our "old" SB5100, we again contacted Arris and asked about a cable modem product that had a comparable spec to the Motorola 6580. Arris recommended we purchase the Arris SB6141. The SB6141 immediately provisioned and is working perfectly.

This product along with other modems with Intel's Puma 6 Chipset is defective and under lawsuit. Arris says they're waiting for Intel for a firmware update, Intel says the release is done through ISP and my ISP Cogeco Communications (Atlantic Broadband) Internet support has no info for a release and also has equipment with Puma 6 Chipset. Problems with high latency, frequent disconnections, lost packets, and unusual behavior with gaming. This issue has been around since November 2016. http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r31079834-ALL-SB6190-is-a-terrible-modem-Intel-Puma-6-MaxLinear-mistake. Arris SB6190, TG1672G, TG1682G, TM1602, Super Hub 3 (Arris TG2492LG) (commonly - virgin media) Hitron CGN3 / CDA / CGNV series modems: CDA-32372, CDE-32372, CDA3-35, CGNV4, CGNM-3552 (commonly - Rogers), CGN3 (eg CGN3-ACSMR) 2013 link, CGNM-2250 (commonly - Shaw), Linksys CM3024, CM3016 TP-Link CR7000 Netgear AC1750, C6300, AC1900, CM700, Telstra Gateway Max (Netgear AC1900 / C6300) (Australia) 2014 link. Cisco DPC3848V (eg »High latency/ping to Shaw router? ), DPC3941B / DPC3941T (commonly - Comcast Xfinity XB3), DPC3939 Compal CH7465-LG / Arris TG2492LG (commonly - Virgin Media Hub 3) Samsung "Home Media Server"

I am on Time Warner Cable's 50Mbps plan and I am consistently getting 56-60Mbps down. (The modem configuration page says I have 16 bonded channels down and 4 up.) I like that this modem gives me room to grow if I want to upgrade my plan and future-proofs me a little as the DOCSIS technology advances. I am using this with an Apple Airport Extreme AC Wi-Fi with no issues; I have DHCP and NAT enabled. I like how small the device's footprint is; it's about the size of 3 CDs together on a shelf. It also doesn't have a huge power adapter block along the cable you have to do something with. It has a small transformer on the plug that goes sideways/horizontal so doesn't cover/block the outlet below it which is nice. The only thing I'm not over the moon with is the very bright LED status lights on the front of the device. I just put some electrical tape over them to keep the blue hue from being so pronounced at night. Some of the light does bleed out of the top air vents and this can't really be prevented. It's too bad there is not a setting in the modem's configuration page to dim the lights. The primary driver for me to purchase this modem was to avoid paying a $10/month rental fee as a new customer. Extremely easy to install - they just added the MAC address (found on the bottom of the modem and on the box) to their system. It took about 5-10 minutes for the modem to update its firmware. Then when you load the internet for the first time you direct your web browser to rr.com. This pulls up their modem activation page where you answer some questions to verify your identity with TWC and then I was surfing the net.

This replaces my owned Arris SurfBoard SB6183 DOCSIS 3.0 Cable Modem (16 download bonding channels and 4 upload bonding channels) which supplemented my TIME WARNER CABLE MAXX Plan of 300Mbps/20Mbps (download/upload) speeds. My Sony 4K UHD TV (XBR-65X950B), Sony Blu-Ray Player (BDP-S7200), Yamaha Aventage A/V Receiver (RX-A850BL), Sony PlayStation 4, and 4 Desktops were all having wired connections, plus wireless-connected 5 laptops. Pros: 32 Bonding download channels and 8 upload bonding channels that can be used even when DOCSIS 3.0 be upgraded to DOCSIS 3.1. Noticed fast connection compared to Arris SB6183. Cons: Time Warner Cable still uses 16 bonding download channels and 4 bonding upload channels, plus the fact that during peak time hours of 4:00 pm to 11:30 pm, connection crawling to 110Mbps download and 10-14Mbps upload speeds. While Comcast at least uses 24 bonding download channels and 8 bonding upload channels. Also, please note that this ARRIS SURFBOARD SB6190 DOCSIS 3.0 Cable Modem is listed as a supported cable modem by TIME WARNER CABLE. Other than the "cons" I've indicated due to TIME WARNER CABLE inefficiencies, this Arris SurfBoard SB6190 DOCSIS 3.0 Cable Modem has a robust connections speeds. NOTE: While some say that "who needs 300Mbps or more ... 1Gbps speeds," however, in this new age, most of our electronic equipments, i.e., TV, A/V Receiver, Blu-Ray Player, PS4 console, X-Box console, cell phones etc. are being connected either wireless or wired to achieved their usability.