I completely understand your frustration but bear with us. I live in Washington and have had the exact, and I mean EXACT issue you are having. I had an Xfinity Xfi Gateway router, an ASUS router, and the core was constantly an issue. My colleagues told me my modem needed to be in bridge mode so I did it and low and behold, zero internet throughout the house anymore. Please keep in mind I’ve been in support and support management for 27 years at this point so I’m frustrated. I replaced the gateway at the Xfinity store twice with no change in my situation. In between, I had engaged Xfinity support too and they were puzzled. They’re the ones that had me swap out modems too. I called to cancel because I was going to switch to a different provider and they got me on the line with someone who knew what they were doing. They remotely reset my modem and enabled bridge mode and got it working for me.
Now in my case, it stopped working and they were unable to re-create the success of the previous person so that’s when I switched to the Motorola modem instead of the ISP-provided one.
My hope is that Xfinity can help. If you put that modem in bridge mode and it takes down your internet, something similar to what I experienced (if not exactly the same) is happening to you.
Given the personal connection to your issue, please keep me posted. We won’t give up!
Yes our issue is exactly the same. I need to step back have a drink and think about this.
I would really hate to go to bluesound as their UI really stinks. But it works.
Motorola does sell a cable modem with 3 Mesh Wi-Fi units in the same package. Perhaps that’s an option. It would be cheaper then keeping the Asus package and getting a new modem and they probably would sink seamlessly .
One thing I know for sure is that you will pay more to use a Motorola. They give a discount and free unlimited data when you have their gateway.
Hopefully, when you contact Xfinity they will know about the issue and fix it right away. Just make sure to tell them you had issues and attempted to enable bridge mode which took your network down.
Don’t give up on it yet. Roon is absolutely demanding of your internal network. No one here would tell you otherwise. It’s just a matter of figuring out what tweak it takes to optimize things.
Ok so I spent all morning and then some talking with Xfinity . Never did get ahold of someone competent enough to understand what I’m trying to do. I guess I’ll try to install my modem and see if I can get that to work. Off to best buy
Hi Mark. Make sure it’s on the list of approved modems for Xfinity. Best Buy likely knows since they are local but just to be sure, please see the link below.
This is getting F$%&ing ridiculous. I spent an entire day on this,had to talk to 5 Xfinity reps just to get the modem working. Now I can’t get the Asus routers to connect. I went to Amazon and found this rewiew:
So far so good (about a week) with this modem. My ISP is Xfinity and it took one try and about 15 minutes to get the unit activated. Most of the time was waiting for apps or the modem to connect. To bypass calling customer support for activation (if all goes well) requires apps that connect to the internet, which will be down to you ISP during activation, this method requires a cellular internet connection with a tablet or smart phone. Save some time and download the Arris and Xfinity apps before you start the activation. The unit looks and feels kind of toyish and is ridiculously small and light compared to my former modem. It does however work well, I’m now getting the download speeds I’m paying for, an extra 100 MB/s that the old modem could not support and could upgrade the speed of the connection. On the down side although the unit has 2 Ethernet ports only one will connect to Xfinity since they (now) only support one IP address per connection. For me I finally figured out the second port has no use and it took a bit of searching to find that out. If your ISP supports dual IPs you could connect additional devices or a switch directly to the modem and not have to connect to a router. Otherwise its dead space. All in all if you only need a DOCSIS 3.1 modem the SB8200 is a great value.
So now WHAT??
Mark, I had to replace my parents’ cable modem this time last year, and then reconnect it to their Linksys Velop mesh network. Let me see if we can work some of the issues you are experiencing.
First, have you verified that your cable modem is passing network traffic from either or both of its Ethernet ports? I connected my parents’ iMac with an Ethernet cable to their cable modem (nothing else attached to the modem) and used a web browser to verify the computer could get an IP address and that it could send/receive internet traffic. From what I can tell in the user guides for the SB8200, Arris is recommending using “the first” Ethernet port, which is assume is the top or furthest to the edge, which may be what is referenced in the review copy you posted above.
If the internet connection is confirmed by you, then the next step is to connect the ASUS router. The “first” Ethernet port should be connected to the ASUS WAN (blue) port on the primary ASUS router with. If I remember correctly, the XT8 recommends then connecting the second XT8 node to the first with an Ethernet cable as the lights go from blue to white to setup their mesh and IP addresses.
One a side note, the Ethernet cables we received for both the modem and the routers were faulty. Replacing them solved our final connectivity issues.
Let us know where you are having problems and we’ll do our best to help you.
Robert, Both ports on the Arris will work but only one at a time. I did try swapping them around as you suggested. I called Arris and they confirmed that the only way that both ports will work is to have 2 IP’s. So I called Xfinity and they said no dice you only get 1.
I don’t see how this will ever work using a port out of the cable modem because of an IP conflict. Thats exactly what happened with the Xfinity modem. When I asked the rep from Xfinity why it didn’t work when I tried to use that modem in bridge mode they said the result is the same you can only have 1 IP. That seems to be true as I did get the Asus working on the Xfinity modem but still couldn’t use roon because roon wanted to be on the same ip as the core. The Asus must have followd the same IP as the Xfinity router. I don’t see how else that could of worked but it did and it worked well.
I think the only solution would be one of those modems thats bundled with the mesh nodes and I’m still not sure that will work either.
The only thing that I’m sure of is that after spending $550 I’m worse of now then when I started. As it stands right now I have no Wi Fi.
Its morning now and I have a clear mind. I think that the reason that the XT8s worked withe Xfinity modem is because it was also a routers as well alowing it to set up its own IPs.
I have to return the Arris and find something else I see alot of the Motorola modems say they will pair with any Wi FI router. I’ll see if they have any at best buy if not I’ll need to order from Amazon
Is your Xfinity modem still in the mix like it sounds? It shouldn’t. In all setups you have a traditional coax cable coming from the wall that goes into your modem. Your modem doesn’t need anything other than 1 ethernet port that connects to the WAN port on your router.
It sounds like the Xfinity modem/router combo is still in the mix though and they’re very confused about what you need.
I am at my desk all day today and will help you through this. Please let me know.
Wes the Xfinity modem is no longer in the system. The Arris surfboard modem will not work as only one port can be used with only 1 IP.
It’s too bad Xfinity will only give me one. After speaking to Arris they confirmed that only one port works with only 1 IP. They said it would be blazing fast if I could have 2 IPs
Router (upside down and dusty sorry). The black cable goes from my modem to the WAN port on my router. The yellow one goes out to a switch that facilitates my LAN connection on opposite sides of my house. If you don’t have a switch, this part is unnecessary:
So, this setup (and every other consumer setup) only gives you one EXTERNAL IP which is all you need. The ASUS router you have will give out internal IPs to devices connected via ethernet or WiFi.
I never thought of that I was so focused on getting the modem to work. I’m working on another modem now that has a built in switch . If that doesn’t work I’ll put in a switch. I have one laying around here somewhere .
It’s alive!! The reason it took so long is the Asus didn’t want to play nice and I had a heck of a time configuring them. I guess after doing it so many times they got stubborn.
Now do I dare updated to 2.0?
Yes. Absolutely. Configuring the port forwarding for ARC can be a challenge for some but worth the effort. I suggest you install 2.0 on your core and remotes for now. Take a break from the tech stuff or a day and come back to get Arc working. Just use the guide below and feel free to ask the community for help.
I have to share this.
One of the things I failed to understand when I started with Roon is just how inept my home network was for high-res audio. I thought my ASUS would fix my issues but I quickly found that my $400 router doesn’t play well with a 3k sq ft tri-level home despite being centrally located. Then I added the hardwiring and mesh nodes. I believe I’m at a $1200 investment now. But… Zero problems that a reboot wouldn’t fix.
The point being, if it can frustrate or otherwise discredit my understanding of networking after 27 plus years in IT, you’ve done great in getting things going and I commend you.
