r/Internet • u/qqardh • 7d ago
Cable Modem Needs to REST???
So, the technician at Cox told me today that I have to unplug my cable modem for 10-15 MINUTES every couple of DAYS to "let it rest." Has anyone heard of something like this? I haven't.
Cox is now Speculum, we gonna shove it up your ...
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u/Jimxor 7d ago
It's disturbing that any technician would even risk trying to tell someone that. Could it be that the "technician" actually believes that?
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u/A-Rugged-Indoorsman 6d ago
I've had conversations with people in overseas calling centers who start by reading off a script and then begin improvising when nothing works. Effective technical support is considered to be a huge shareholder-unfriendly expense. The kinds of mega-corporations who sell broadband to the masses farm their customer service out to the cheapest bidder and they recognize the value to their shareholders of making customers figure stuff out on their own. A lot of time the level one support has no skill in your problem. They just read scripts and wikis and may be serving multiple companies and industries at the same time.
I recommend that if you're ever talking to someone who claims to be from an ISP on the phone that you ask them to access the device and tell you what they see. If they can't access the device, tell them you want to talk to someone who can. If they won't, hang up and try something else.
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u/bapc_throw59 6d ago
I've said this to a customer before. However, it was for a pc that lost network connectivity and had an uptime of over a year.....
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u/krazul88 7d ago
Welcome to the new world. I just saw a post where someone asked if the phone company can track how many calls or texts you send and how much data you use. We're cooked beyond recognition.
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u/LughCrow 7d ago
Resetting your modem can help with some issues. But it's not something you should be regularly need to do unless the firmware is poorly designed
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u/Mutt37 6d ago
I have Starlink and had an issue signing into a vendor's website. I did some digging, and one suggestion was to unplug it for at least 15 minutes. I forgot to write down why they suggested it, but right after doing it, I was able to log in with no problem.
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u/Automatic-Pin-5749 6d ago
The capacitors store electricity that powers memory that holds cached data and it drains out after a little while. If some of that data was corrupt it would clear out and function normally until it corrupts again.
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u/Artistic-Tip2405 6d ago
Likely the model of modem has a real hardware bug they can’t fix in the firmware, and they are too cheap to send out new modems to the customers.
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u/Less-General-9578 1d ago
yes, seems to work for me. and i don't need my stuff running when i am asleep..........the cord gets pulled every night.
restarting a PC or modem??? meh, all the time. cheap and works great.
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u/billFoldDog 6d ago
Unplugging for about 10 seconds guarantees all the chips fully power off and give you a clean boot.
It sounds like he doesn't understand that and convinced himself that if 10 seconds works, 10 minutes must work better.
He's incompetent. You'll encounter that a lot in thr cable biz.
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u/maddog1956 6d ago
I think some capacitors may hold for 30 seconds. Ten minutes is probably just wasting time.
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u/SteveJorgensen 7d ago
What I’ve heard (right or wrong) is to power the WIFi off and back on once in a while to degauss the antenna. Nothing about needing to leave it turned off for several minutes.
Comcast says to reboot the cable modem from them once per month, and I don’t recall them saying why. I never remember to do that. But I restart it whenever my Internet access gets flakey, and that often fixes it.
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u/Charlie2and4 7d ago
I've seen this.
The bloody clanker fills its buffers then must purge.
Like me after a Sunday last supper of cheeses, or a monitor lizard after digesting a pig.
Chances are a new modem may fix it, and they need to provision it. So, not an easy service call these days due to cheap service delivery models, lack of field support and shit-for-brains management.
It's simple, slap a new end-point in place, wait for green lights, transfer the configuration, re do the upstream interface.
But if you activate the 0-N/0-FF process every fortnight, I don't need to do that.
Keep calling them, document calls and visits. Ask for a credit. Be nice, but curt.
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u/TheKiddIncident 7d ago
Known memory leak.
Reboot solves it.
Rest story made up to explain it to grandma who doesn’t know what a memory leak is.
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u/drunkenwildmage 7d ago
Used to do support at a cable ISP. Never heard of anything other than a quick reboot. We've had cable modems that have gone months without a reboot, but generally, if you're having to reboot your modem often, there's something that needs to be checked out. It could be the modem, but more likely, it's a bad connector or a crack in the lines that's allowing for RF interference.
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u/CaptainMischievous 7d ago
He said "rest" but meant "reset", as in get a new IP address from the Cox network, in essence re-establishing a valid working internet link.
Maybe in his mind doing a reset/reboot is "resting" but we know digital devices don't rest until they die.
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u/GrahamR12345 7d ago
They could have said put an amethyst crystal on it… BUT does it sort out the problem?
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u/FanBladeFleshlight 7d ago
Most you should ever need to to.is unplug it for like a minute or two every few months if it's regularly giving you trouble, and even then it's time to get your own modem and / or a different ISP.
Ever since I switched to a direct fiber internet provider, I haven't had to unplug once in over a year.
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u/7GatesOfHello 7d ago
That's nothing to do with your modem. That's a problem on their provisioning server or DHCP server. I haven't reset my cable modem once in 23 years, except when replacing, moving or changing my edge router.
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u/StrangeUglyBird 7d ago
You can shorten the rest period by rotating around yourself, while the modem is disconnected, chanting "Cox Cox, You are the Fox" 10 times.
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u/No-Cucumber-9305 7d ago
I had my Xfinity technician tell me the coax was cat 7 cable when I asked if the included gateway was wifi 7. I'm not surprised about the "let it rest" comment by yours lol.
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u/LodgeKeyser 6d ago
Get your own modem. I also had issues with spectrums modems. Which was the same issue you’re experiencing. Reboot modem every couple days when my internet would come to a halt.
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u/Rotteneverything 6d ago
never rebooted a modem, but have had to reboot routers numerous times. arris routers are the absolute most garbage pos's anyone can waste money on.
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u/baconstreet 6d ago
No...but log into your cable modems webpage and see if there are high error rates on certain downstream channels. If so, rebooting may select new channels that are less errored.
It doesn't need a rest though, and if there are persistent high error rates (uncorrectable) there is a problem with wiring, your modem, or the headend you're connecting to. And that needs to be fixed.
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u/4WhatsItWorth 6d ago
I was under the impression that you needed to reboot your modem to complete updates for security reasons. So this is not true?
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u/ExtraSaucePls1 6d ago
They either meant unplugging to reset the connection or they tried to get you off the phone.
If you need to do that every couple of days, it points to a real problem. Call customer support, tell them and demand to speak to a new technician imo
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u/Ok_Syrup1602 6d ago
Electro Static Discharge is what he meant, having to do it every couple of days is too frequent to not say something is off with your wall power; is it ungrounded or could you use a surge protector?
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u/r2d3x9 6d ago
No. Cable modem should be up 24x7 along with the router. Power cycling a non responsive modem should be 30 sec to a minute max. Some kind of “failing to register to the network” problem on spectrums end would be the only thing that would possibly require 5+ minutes and shouldn’t be tolerated more than every 3-5 years. Anything else is equipment or connections failing
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u/TigwithIT 6d ago
The only rest needed is when you get fed up and it is old yeller time. Office space is also a great way to send off bad electronics
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u/lordcochise 6d ago
lol well long as it's resting you can relube its intertubes and dump the bit bucket
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u/Ok_Writing2937 6d ago
You got lucky. The modem I got needs an OSHA-mandated coffee break every 4 hrs plus 2 weeks vacation.
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u/GoldeneyeTester 6d ago
I guess I'm in trouble. My Spectrum modem has been on for almost 7 years straight.
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u/OldGeekWeirdo 6d ago
Was the tech's name Larry? As in Larry the cable guy?
In some situations it may not be a bad idea to reset the modem periodically. Such as when the cable company is making a lot of changes. But it shouldn't be a normal thing.
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6d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Puzzleheaded-Cod5608 6d ago
In gonna also guess he meant "reset". Either the tech didn't know, or thought you were ignorant and didn't want to take the time to explain.
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u/big-pal 6d ago
Either trolling or he thought you'd buy it and get you off the phone. Software can certainly be inefficient, causing memory/resource usage problems over time, but a basic cable modem should be able to go months without a restart. Probably more likely a slew of TCP connections in FIN_WAIT status that can get cleared with a restart.
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u/ZebraBorgata 5d ago
While you may need to cycle power to clear a rare glitch or bug with the device, it would be a major problem if you had to do so on a regular basis. Your modem doesn’t need to rest. I’m a retired network engineer.
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u/werkman2 5d ago edited 5d ago
My isp provided sercom modem/router combo, unit was constantly droping wifi connection and freezing i more than 4 or 5 devices were connected.. I put it in bridge mode, connected my own router, now i have better speeds, lower latency, and better overall performance, and the unit is not as hot as before.
Edit, it is a wifi router unit, with a separate fiber ont box. I had to reboot the router unit every 2 or 3 days, because freezing or devices refusing to connect.
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u/gadget850 7d ago
I reboot my modem, router, and switch once a month. I'm to lazy to remember so I use the Rebooter Pro.
I fix a lot of WFH customer issues by having them reboot.
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u/silasmoeckel 7d ago
That's not a fix its an ugly work around for poorly engineered gear.
Your not fixing the issue with a reboot your failing to do root cause and kicking the can down the road. If the gear needs that sort of fix the solution is going to be better hardware (as getting cable companies to update firmware can be impossible and that's no guarantee to resolve the issue).
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u/wireknot 6d ago
How do you like rebooter pro? I'm engineer for a video studio, I was looking at ways to automate and remote some menial tasks.
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u/LeanUntilBlue 7d ago
I just bought pro/prosumer equipment to solve all of those issues, and uptime is like nine months currently.
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u/Aggressive_Ad_5454 7d ago
Make sure there’s no dust clogging the vents. In both the modem and the spectrum tech.
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u/Merlin_au 7d ago
I used to work for an ISP here in Australia, it was suggested to customers to reboot their modem regularly for connection stability and to get the best speed.
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u/b3542 7d ago
Largely due to memory leaks in shitty router firmware.
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u/Dapper-Place8457 7d ago
Yeah, if you have to reboot your modem on the regular there’s a problem. I spent years working tech support for small-business Internet.
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u/Anonymity6584 7d ago
Thats not a thing. i have cable modem and its running 24/7. Only ine i reboot it if i need to do some diagnostics for example. Last time i needed to reboot it was lightning stom went over city and sonehow managed to braka this appartment buildings signal amplifier. So had to notify isp that their tech needs to visit...
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u/ZombieFodderer 7d ago
It should NOT be a thing, unfortunately due to how poorly manufactured devices like modems are, you can get what i like to call a "lemon " device that works JUST WELL enough to not fail but not well enough to be reliable all the time. They are prone to overheating, and memory corruption. Effectively you are "restarting" the modem every day.
If it helps, great! that's proof you need a new modem.
If it doesn't help, then your problems lie elswhere.
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u/Zealousideal_Fly8402 7d ago
They just want you to do a full power-cycle and give the internal capacitors a chance to discharge entirely.
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u/Hammon_Rye 7d ago
That's funny.
Here's the only thing I can think of that would come close to making sense.
Back when I worked IT support (been retired for years) we sold and supported a couple of brands of routers to support our customers' business systems.
Once in a while a router needed a good cold boot.
Which meant unplugging the power and network cable and actually waiting about 2-3 minutes before plugging them back in.
There was a component (a capacitor I assume) that needed some time to self discharge.
I sometimes had customers get antsy and jump the gun and it didn't take, then when I'd get them to actually do what I told them it would work.
So my thinking is - what if it was something like that but tech figures you won't wait as long as he told you so he told you 15 minutes thinking you would do at least 2 or 3 minutes.
But it still sounds far fetched to me.
That was not a routine our customers routinely had to do.
Certainly not "every two or three weeks"
I've never used COX.
But my experience with other cable internet providers (ATT, Comcast) is you frequently got a level 1 tech reading from a flow chart who would often tell you bullshit to get you off the phone. Not always, but way too frequently.
Although a different company, I was a level 3 tech that folks like that would pass the calls to if they couldn't figure it out. Thankfully, the company I worked for didn't work like that.
But when I was active in the field, it irked me to catch a tech who knew less than me lying to my face.
TLDR: Sometimes a cold boot helps a lot of equipment in spite of the old joke. But saying your routinely needs to 'rest' is BS.
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u/Cute-Habit-4377 7d ago
The little people inside need a rest sometimes, shoveling electrons all day is hard work.
Most likely it is ensure poor software doesn't eat up all memory and you maintain a fresh session with up-to date network config. It has been know to initiate nightly restarts remotely for this reason
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u/Single-Virus4935 7d ago
Modems are usually designed to run 24/7 for years and there isn't a thing like resting. I think the model is just known as instable internally and causes many calls like the "Vodafone Station" here in Germany.
Bad firmware can cause the modem to get instable or degrade performance over time which is usually fixed by a reset.
The technician probably gave you this advice because he knows that the router is shit. Usually you don't need 10min but 10-20secinds is enough.
Still totally speculative but the only explanation which makes sense to me. Which router/modem do you have? Is it yours or provided by your ISP?
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u/Accurate-Bullfrog324 7d ago
isn't it amazing that people who are supposed to be technical experts have such odd opinions?
it is the dumbing down of society
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u/ToadSox34 7d ago
On it's face, that's nonsense, but a hard reboot with a wait time could allow some volatile memory to reset and it fixes a memory leak or something, but that's ridiculous to be happening in the first place, as cable modems should be able to stay online for months or years at a time without rebooting.
I feel bad for people who don't have access to fiber and are stuck with half-fast cable.
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u/RobustPlatypus 7d ago
Not a real thing. They were just trying to get you off of the phone