Reddit mentions of Arris Touchstone DOCSIS 3.0 Residential Gateway Wi-Fi 802.11n 4 Port Router, and 2 Voice Lines TG862G

unfortunately in order to use the voice service, you must have an EMTA.. you can do like I did and have two devices setup - a regular modem for Internet then an EMTA for voice only.

if you no longer wish to rent, your options are limited.. either rent a gateway from Comcast or purchase your own. New voice capable modems cost between $200 and $300. I would personally recommend avoiding those as they all have a buggy chipset that leaves them vulnerable to a trivial Denial of Service attack (while the alert is from Netgear, this issue effects every modem/gateway with the Intel Puma 6 chipset).

you could do like I did, and get a used EMTA from Amazon. I got an Arris TG862G - https://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B008KRLZCW/ref=olp_f_primeEligible?ie=UTF8&f_primeEligible=true

I got mine from the vendor "3.0", the other vendor "Precision" I dealt with before and they're decent. IMO it's worth it.. Yes it's a used device, but the're guaranteeing them for 6-12 months, plus there is Amazon's 30 day unconditional return policy so the risk is little other than time.

I have my TG862G setup and provisioned for Voice only, and beside it is a Motorola MB8600 provisioned for Internet.

Yes you can find cheaper :

https://www.amazon.com/Touchstone-Residential-Gateway-802-11n-TG862G/dp/B008KRLZCW/

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01MSTB5KW/

Good luck with Comcast

I don't usually like all-in-ones but the motorola surboard modems are the best, so I'd probably get something like this
http://www.amazon.com/Motorola-SURFboard-Gateway-SBG6580-Wireless/dp/B0040IUI46/

which is basically the surfboard modem with a router built in.

This netgear wouldn't be bad either.

http://www.amazon.com/NETGEAR-DOCSIS-Cable-Modem-Router/dp/B00IF0JAYE/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1406839994&sr=8-6&keywords=TG852G

If you plan on going with a triple play type service with phone in the future, you'll want something like this:

http://www.amazon.com/Arris-TG862G-Residential-Gateway-802-11n/dp/B008KRLZCW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1406840138&sr=8-1&keywords=router+voice

but the cost is going to be higher.

I work for Comcast and take part in pushing these new wireless gateways on our poor customers who have perfectly good, stable modems in place. My advice is to steer clear. If everything is working fine then why mess with it? Comcast has us pushing them so hard because they want to build their Xfinity Wifi public hotspot network. Not really that big of a deal considering that the bandwidth for strangers connecting to the hotspot is so limited that it has negligible performance impact to your actual in-home network and there really isn't any additional security risk at all. The problem is that our wireless gateways are built cheap and have a much higher failure rate than any modem we've leased in the past. There was even an alert sent out to employees a couple weeks back about a design flaw where the coax cable can become loose from the back of the modem and cause an ingress signal leakage which severely harms both upstream and downstream bandwidth and the solution offered by Comcast is to advise that "tightening the coax connection a quarter turn should resolve the issue."

As far as purchasing your own modem, I say go for it. At $10/month for your Comcast rental, it'll pay for itself in time. The SURFboard SB6141 you posted is a fine choice, though I personally prefer the Arris CM820 or if you have phone service with Comcast then the Arris TG862G (you'll notice the modems with phone ports are quite a bit more expensive but what can you do?) The only reason I prefer these over the SURFboard models is that they're built like fucking tanks. I guarantee either of those two would keep working until they've become obsolete and then even some time after that. I picked up the Arris TM722 new off Amazon more than 5 years ago and haven't had an issue with it yet. One other thing to note is that if you do pick up a modem that has built in wifi, expect to disable the wifi on it because I can almost guarantee that your dedicated wireless router will have a stronger signal strength anyway.

Lastly, this may not happen to you, but when I made the switch to my own, purchased modem and called in to Comcast customer support to have it added on and activated on my account, it took four or five calls before getting a rep that was competent enough to know how to even enter the serial number onto my account. More than one agent told me after trying for some time that they don't support that model, but it's the same fucking model they were actively leasing to their customers at the time and is even on the list of Comcast supported internet modems so don't get discouraged if you hit some static while going through that process. You will eventually find an agent that knows what they're doing. Anyways, best of luck with your ongoing relationship with Comcast :)

Just go to Amazon and Search "Cable modem docsis 3.0" make sure and get an all-in-1 wifi router/modem. I got a 4 port, 2 phone line, wifi router/modem for like 27$ (128$ New!!!!) The cheapest one I'd purchase from the "used" section now is 33$ from Lyon's Electronics. I wouldn't trust the other lower priced ones.

https://www.amazon.com/TG862G-Telephony-DOCSlS-Wireless-Xfinity/dp/B008KRLZCW

You shouldn't have to upgrade unless you find you're always experiencing downtime or the speeds you're paying for can't be fully implemented due to your equipment being unable to operate that fast. Check router/modem documentation to see its max speeds.

Off topic but if i wanted to but my own modem for only data and voice (i'm thinking its VoIP), would this one work?
[http://www.amazon.com/TG862G-DOCSIS-Residential-Gateway-802-11n/dp/B008KRLZCW#Ask]

would they even let me activate it?

Planning to have a small LAN party on the 30th with 3 friends. That'd be 3 different PCs (one of them is a laptop). [This is the device that I use to get an internet connection] (https://www.amazon.com/Arris-TG862G-Residential-Gateway-802-11n/dp/B008KRLZCW). I need detailed step-by-step instructions on how to connect all three computers in LAN so we can play games locally, please. OK thanks for your time :D

> TG862G

As I suspected, you have telephone service from Comcast. This complicates things considerably.

I think you might be better off finding a more centrally located place in your house for your gateway. Is the current location the only place in the house with a free coax cable TV port?

Got the upgrade at 40514.

QUESTION:
I have this modem bridged into this router and my speed seems maxed out at 100. Shouldn't it be good for 300? Is there any settings I need to check on either device?

http://beta.speedtest.net/result/5321577949

I'm testing wirelessly however I know good speeds are reachable (I've gotten UpTo 90mbs) and have had slow downs with techs here. I've tried bridging the signal to another modem because I'm using an older ARRIS gateway. Same issues... The worst part is I don't have any PC's in my house to test a hardwired connection. But I have proven that it isn't a wireless signal issue. When dealing with techs they told me that it was my modem at first. Then I had a level 3 communication tech come out who told me it wasn't my modem signal. He tested for wireless interference and checked the lines from my modem to the box and found 3 potential issues which he resolved two of (arcing connector's). This level the signal strength issue which they send out a crew to fix. However it is actually worse now. I'm almost willing to get their modem (however I have had horrible experiences just like this with their modem years ago).






Arris TG862G DOCSIS 3.0 Residential Gateway with
802.11n, 4 Port Router and 2 Voice Lines https://www.amazon.com/dp/B008KRLZCW/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_6-5yybN7DBYCE

Please bear with me - I'm not a total Neanderthal, but I'm far from an expert about this stuff. 192.168.0.1 is telling me B/G/N mixed, 20/40 MHz, channel is set to auto. I have this router which says it has 2x3 MIMO and does not appear to be dual band. Does this help? What else should I look for?