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My 2 year old Surboard 6190 modem has been dropping connections lately and I’ve not been able to return it to stable performance. It’ll be fine for a while and then drop repeatedly for a hour just because.

I’ve done the unplug/plugin and the hard reset without improving the stability, the cable provider confirms no service interruptions and the tv which comes through the same line is unaffected.

In the past, this type of behavior was a sign that firmware needed update, but I cant even figure out if this product allows or requires firmware update. Nothing is here where it would be expected   : https://arris.secure.force.com/consumers/ConsumerProductDetail?p=a0ha000000REMs8AAH#panel4

Searching Arris and various online sources finds no clear answer, the possibilities are:

  1. The modem requires no updating, it’s automatic
  2. The modem requires the user to manually update the firmware
  3. The cable company pushes updates to the modem, (but possibly only if they own the equipment, if not it’s unclear what happens. Xfinity says they do not push firmware in my instance)

What the heck, is this fairly young moden just failing or do I need to update firmware?

Found this but it leaves a lot of space for interpretation.

The title “UPGRADING FIRMWARE ON CABLE DEVICES” could mean that only Devices owned by the cable company (“Cable Devices”)  are part of their automatic updates. 

I think/hope it means the Xfinity pushes updates to ALL connected devices. But if that’s so, why does Xfinity know nothing about this policy?

 

https://arris.secure.force.com/consumers/articles/General_FAQs/Upgrading-Firmware-on-Cable-Devices

 

 

Per the docsis spec, the actual ISP is the one to push the firmware to modems. The manufactuer (arris, netgear, tplink) supplies the firmware (if there’s updates) to the isp and they certify it and push it out. Sadly, certifying it costs $ for the ISP so they rarely update unless there’s a critical error. 

 

Do you have a screen snip of your cable connections info from your modem and the event logs? usually connection issues tend to be issues with the line. 

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