Need Cable Modem info....

Art Scott

A Group I am involved with is in a building that is cabled for Teles....Cox Cable....the hook ups are on from the basement to the top floor......my question is....

Will any cable modem work, say like one off ebay ?? Do they have to be specific to the region, do they need to be formatted, somehow ...... This is totally foreign to me.

We thought of using wireless from an upstairs office but the building is so full of concrete and steel that you cannot get any cell phone reception with out being in the hallway next to a window....so we have to do wired connnections on our floor.


Thanks in advance.

Dan7312

It depends on the cable provider. There is a standard called DOCSIS and if the provider supports that then you should be able to use any DOCSIS modem. If you check at your local BestBuy or other they can usually tell which of the router/modems they have will work with your cable provider. The modem manufacturer's help desk will usually help you set things up too.

In fact if you call the help line for places like netgear and others they usually know which of their modems work with which cable providers.

But usually the cable provider includes a modem with the internet service and then you just plug a regular router into that. The modem has a coax connection and a few ethernet ports on it... if it has enough ports you might not need anything else.

Have you checked with Cox? They may be able to tell you what you will need.

If you get you own router/modem and there are network issues it will probably slow down Cox from fixing things even if the problem is on their end. If it's one their modems they easily set up things in the modem remotely to test things.

Here are some links that talk about cable modems and cox

http://www.broadbandinfo.com/cox-communications/high-speed-internet/cable-modems.html

http://www.amazon.com/Cox-approved-modems/lm/R1R32I8ZJQVP6I

Art Scott wrote: »

A Group I am involved with is in a building that is cabled for Teles....Cox Cable....the hook ups are on from the basement to the top floor......my question is....

Will any cable modem work, say like one off ebay ?? Do they have to be specific to the region, do they need to be formatted, somehow ...... This is totally foreign to me.

We thought of using wireless from an upstairs office but the building is so full of concrete and steel that you cannot get any cell phone reception with out being in the hallway next to a window....so we have to do wired connnections on our floor.


Thanks in advance.

Art Scott

Thanks.......will give close check to the links... THANX AGAIN

novicesnapper

Art, be careful about buying one (used) off of Ebay or Craigslist. Cox Cable won't activate an used one, unless it's been "released" by the account holder beforehand. They will crosscheck the serial and Mac to make sure it's not tied up. Cox is pretty good about uploading the correct config into the modem, when you call them to activate the modem. If you're running a router behind that, wireless, four port for expansion, most are setup to auto config so you can get the internet, but may not have features turned on, like firewall, flood protection, etc. You have to log in and change those setting yourself.