Comcast setup & cable modem fees

[Jerry Feldman]

On Monday 20 March 2006 1:23 pm, dsr at tao.merseine.nu wrote:
> On Mon, Mar 20, 2006 at 01:12:50PM -0500, Doug wrote:
> > Comcast wants to do it all for $99/month.  I was clicking through
> > their online order page, and they had two fees I had questions about.
> > The first was a cable modem for $99.  Is that a good deal, bad deal,
> > or what?
>
> You can:
>
> - buy a modem from a third party.
> - buy a modem from Comcast.
> - rent a modem from Comcast -- in which case, any problems with
>   it are their problems. That's my preference.
>
> > The second was a software installation fee of $150 for 2-5
> > computers.  Right now I have DSL from Verizon with a router box that
> > does DHCP.  All the computers in the house have no trouble connecting
> > to it.  In an ideal world, a cable Internet connection would also be a
> > DHCP server, and no software needs to be installed.  Can this software
> > install be avoided?  Just trying to avoid $250 worth of initial fees.
I own my own cable modem (Motorola SB5100) and my own Router (Linksys 
Wireless SRX). 
Note that Comcast Digital Voice for $39.00 requires an eMTA cable modem if 
you also want to use them for phone. 

My $0.02 -
Buy or rent a cable modem - just make sure you get a decent brand. The 
Motorolas seem to be good, and the 3Coms have had problems. Some people 
like the Linksys ones. 

For networking, I would advise getting your own router. The Linksys 4-port 
wired routers are under $40 - probably closer to $20 mail order. The 
wireless routers range from under $40 for 402.11B to a bit over $100 for 
some of the fancy features. I got one of the newer SRX versions because the 
vanilla one that I had was somewhat limited in range and I needed to extend 
the range in my house.

Essentially, you have the skills to set up your home network. If you can 
take the router you already have, then it should be sufficient.

BTW: My Comcast connection has been rock solid for a long time. I have not 
had to reset my cable modem in a long time. 

-- 
Jerry Feldman <gaf at blu.org>
Boston Linux and Unix user group
http://www.blu.org PGP key id:C5061EA9
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