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A cable modem is a type of
network bridge A network bridge is a computer networking device that creates a single, aggregate network from multiple communication networks or network segments. This function is called network bridging. Bridging is distinct from routing. Routing allows ...
that provides bi-directional data communication via radio frequency channels on a
hybrid fibre-coaxial Hybrid fiber-coaxial (HFC) is a telecommunications industry term for a broadband network that combines optical fiber and coaxial cable. It has been commonly employed globally by cable television operators since the early 1990s. In a hybrid fib ...
(HFC),
radio frequency over glass In telecommunications, radio frequency over glass (RFoG) is a deep-fiber network design in which the coax portion of the hybrid fiber coax (HFC) network is replaced by a single-fiber passive optical network (PON). Downstream and return-path trans ...
(RFoG) and
coaxial cable Coaxial cable, or coax (pronounced ) is a type of electrical cable consisting of an inner conductor surrounded by a concentric conducting shield, with the two separated by a dielectric ( insulating material); many coaxial cables also have a p ...
infrastructure. Cable modems are primarily used to deliver
broadband Internet access Internet access is the ability of individuals and organizations to connect to the Internet using computer terminals, computers, and other devices; and to access services such as email and the World Wide Web. Internet access is sold by Inte ...
in the form of
cable Internet In telecommunications, cable Internet access, shortened to cable Internet, is a form of broadband Internet access which uses the same infrastructure as a cable television. Like digital subscriber line and fiber to the premises services, cable Inte ...
, taking advantage of the high
bandwidth Bandwidth commonly refers to: * Bandwidth (signal processing) or ''analog bandwidth'', ''frequency bandwidth'', or ''radio bandwidth'', a measure of the width of a frequency range * Bandwidth (computing), the rate of data transfer, bit rate or thr ...
of a HFC and RFoG network. They are commonly deployed in the
Americas The Americas, which are sometimes collectively called America, are a landmass comprising the totality of North America, North and South America. The Americas make up most of the land in Earth's Western Hemisphere and comprise the New World. ...
,
Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an are ...
,
Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...
, and
Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...
.


History


MITRE Cablenet

Internet Experiment Note (IEN) 96IEN 96
- The
MITRE The mitre (Commonwealth English) (; Greek: μίτρα, "headband" or "turban") or miter (American English; see spelling differences), is a type of headgear now known as the traditional, ceremonial headdress of bishops and certain abbots in ...
Cablenet Project
(1979) describes an early RF cable modem system. From pages 2 and 3 of IEN 96:
The Cable-Bus System The MITRE/Washington Cablenet system is based on a technology developed at MITRE/Bedford. Similar cable-bus systems are in operation at a number of government sites, e.g.
Walter Reed Army Hospital The Walter Reed Army Medical Center (WRAMC)known as Walter Reed General Hospital (WRGH) until 1951was the U.S. Army's flagship medical center from 1909 to 2011. Located on in the District of Columbia, it served more than 150,000 active and ret ...
, and the
NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research. NASA was established in 1958, succeedin ...
Johnson Space Center The Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center (JSC) is NASA's center for human spaceflight (originally named the Manned Spacecraft Center), where human spaceflight training, research, and flight control are conducted. It was renamed in honor of the late ...
, but these are all standalone, local-only networks. The system uses standard
Community Antenna Television Cable television is a system of delivering television programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This contrasts with broa ...
(CATV)
coaxial cable Coaxial cable, or coax (pronounced ) is a type of electrical cable consisting of an inner conductor surrounded by a concentric conducting shield, with the two separated by a dielectric ( insulating material); many coaxial cables also have a p ...
and microprocessor based Bus Interface Units (BIUs) to connect subscriber
computer A computer is a machine that can be programmed to carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations ( computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as programs. These prog ...
s and terminals to the cable. ... The cable bus consists of two parallel coaxial cables, one inbound and the other outbound. The inbound cable and outbound cable are connected at one end, the headend, and electrically terminated at their other ends. This architecture takes advantage of the well developed unidirectional CATV
components Circuit Component may refer to: •Are devices that perform functions when they are connected in a circuit.   In engineering, science, and technology Generic systems *System components, an entity with discrete structure, such as an assemb ...
. The
topology In mathematics, topology (from the Greek words , and ) is concerned with the properties of a geometric object that are preserved under continuous deformations, such as stretching, twisting, crumpling, and bending; that is, without closing ...
is dendritic (i.e. branched like a tree).
...
The BIUs contain
Radio Frequency Radio frequency (RF) is the oscillation rate of an alternating electric current or voltage or of a magnetic, electric or electromagnetic field or mechanical system in the frequency range from around to around . This is roughly between the up ...
(RF) modems which modulate a
carrier signal In telecommunications, a carrier wave, carrier signal, or just carrier, is a waveform (usually sinusoidal) that is modulated (modified) with an information-bearing signal for the purpose of conveying information. This carrier wave usually has ...
to transmit
digital Digital usually refers to something using discrete digits, often binary digits. Technology and computing Hardware *Digital electronics, electronic circuits which operate using digital signals ** Digital camera, which captures and stores digital ...
information Information is an abstract concept that refers to that which has the power to inform. At the most fundamental level information pertains to the interpretation of that which may be sensed. Any natural process that is not completely random, ...
using 1 MHz of the available
bandwidth Bandwidth commonly refers to: * Bandwidth (signal processing) or ''analog bandwidth'', ''frequency bandwidth'', or ''radio bandwidth'', a measure of the width of a frequency range * Bandwidth (computing), the rate of data transfer, bit rate or thr ...
in the 24 MHz frequency range. The remainder of the 294 MHz bandwidth can be used to carry other
communication channel A communication channel refers either to a physical transmission medium such as a wire, or to a logical connection over a multiplexed medium such as a radio channel in telecommunications and computer networking. A channel is used for informa ...
s, such as
off-the-air In the broadcasting industry, a dark television station or silent radio station is one that has gone off the air for an indefinite period of time. Usually unlike dead air (broadcasting only silence), a station that is dark or silent does not e ...
TV, FM, closed circuit TV, or a
voice The human voice consists of sound made by a human being using the vocal tract, including talking, singing, laughing, crying, screaming, shouting, humming or yelling. The human voice frequency is specifically a part of human sound producti ...
telephone system, or, other digital channels. The data rate of our test-bed system is 307.2  kbps.


IEEE 802.3b (10BROAD36)

The
IEEE The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is a 501(c)(3) professional association for electronic engineering and electrical engineering (and associated disciplines) with its corporate office in New York City and its operati ...
802 Committee defined
10BROAD36 10BROAD36 is an obsolete computer network standard in the Ethernet family. It was developed during the 1980s and specified in IEEE 802.3b-1985. The standard supports 10 Mbit/s Ethernet signals over standard 75 ohm cable television (CATV) ...
in 802.3b-1985IEEE 802.3b-1985 (10BROAD36)
- Supplement to 802.3: Broadband Medium Attachment Unit and Broadband Medium Specifications, Type 10BROAD36 (Section 11)
as a 10
Mbit/s In telecommunications, data-transfer rate is the average number of bits ( bitrate), characters or symbols ( baudrate), or data blocks per unit time passing through a communication link in a data-transmission system. Common data rate units are mu ...
IEEE 802.3 IEEE 802.3 is a working group and a collection standards defining the physical layer and data link layer's media access control (MAC) of wired Ethernet. The standards are produced by the working group of Institute of Electrical and Electronics ...
/
Ethernet Ethernet () is a family of wired computer networking technologies commonly used in local area networks (LAN), metropolitan area networks (MAN) and wide area networks (WAN). It was commercially introduced in 1980 and first standardized in 1 ...
broadband system to run up to over CATV coax network cabling. The word ''
broadband In telecommunications, broadband is wide bandwidth data transmission which transports multiple signals at a wide range of frequencies and Internet traffic types, that enables messages to be sent simultaneously, used in fast internet connections. ...
'' as used in the original IEEE 802.3 specifications implied operation in frequency-division multiplexed ( FDM) channel bands as opposed to digital ''
baseband In telecommunications and signal processing, baseband is the range of frequencies occupied by a signal that has not been modulated to higher frequencies. Baseband signals typically originate from transducers, converting some other variable i ...
'' square-waveform
modulation In electronics and telecommunications, modulation is the process of varying one or more properties of a periodic waveform, called the '' carrier signal'', with a separate signal called the ''modulation signal'' that typically contains informat ...
s (also known as line coding), which begin near zero Hz and theoretically consume
infinite Infinite may refer to: Mathematics * Infinite set, a set that is not a finite set *Infinity, an abstract concept describing something without any limit Music *Infinite (group), a South Korean boy band *''Infinite'' (EP), debut EP of American m ...
frequency bandwidth. (In real-world systems, higher-order
signal In signal processing, a signal is a function that conveys information about a phenomenon. Any quantity that can vary over space or time can be used as a signal to share messages between observers. The '' IEEE Transactions on Signal Processing' ...
components Circuit Component may refer to: •Are devices that perform functions when they are connected in a circuit.   In engineering, science, and technology Generic systems *System components, an entity with discrete structure, such as an assemb ...
become indistinguishable from background
noise Noise is unwanted sound considered unpleasant, loud or disruptive to hearing. From a physics standpoint, there is no distinction between noise and desired sound, as both are vibrations through a medium, such as air or water. The difference aris ...
.) In the market
10BROAD36 10BROAD36 is an obsolete computer network standard in the Ethernet family. It was developed during the 1980s and specified in IEEE 802.3b-1985. The standard supports 10 Mbit/s Ethernet signals over standard 75 ohm cable television (CATV) ...
equipment was not developed by many vendors nor deployed in many user networks as compared to equipment for IEEE 802.3/
Ethernet Ethernet () is a family of wired computer networking technologies commonly used in local area networks (LAN), metropolitan area networks (MAN) and wide area networks (WAN). It was commercially introduced in 1980 and first standardized in 1 ...
baseband In telecommunications and signal processing, baseband is the range of frequencies occupied by a signal that has not been modulated to higher frequencies. Baseband signals typically originate from transducers, converting some other variable i ...
standards such as
10BASE5 10BASE5 (also known as thick Ethernet or thicknet) was the first commercially available variant of Ethernet. The technology was standardized in 1982 as IEEE 802.3. 10BASE5 uses a thick and stiff coaxial cable up to in length. Up to 100 stati ...
(1983),
10BASE2 10BASE2 (also known as cheapernet, thin Ethernet, thinnet, and thinwire) is a variant of Ethernet that uses thin coaxial cable terminated with BNC connectors to build a local area network. During the mid to late 1980s this was the domin ...
(1985),
10BASE-T 1 (one, unit, unity) is a number representing a single or the only entity. 1 is also a numerical digit and represents a single unit of counting or measurement. For example, a line segment of ''unit length'' is a line segment of length 1 ...
(1990), etc.


IEEE 802.7

The
IEEE The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) is a 501(c)(3) professional association for electronic engineering and electrical engineering (and associated disciplines) with its corporate office in New York City and its operati ...
802 Committee also specified a broadband CATV digital networking standard in 1989 with 802.7-1989. However, like
10BROAD36 10BROAD36 is an obsolete computer network standard in the Ethernet family. It was developed during the 1980s and specified in IEEE 802.3b-1985. The standard supports 10 Mbit/s Ethernet signals over standard 75 ohm cable television (CATV) ...
, 802.7-1989 saw little commercial success.


Hybrid networks

Hybrid Networks developed, demonstrated and patented the first high-speed, asymmetrical cable modem system in 1990. A key Hybrid Networks insight was that in the nascent days of the Internet, data downloading constitutes the majority of the data traffic, and this can be served adequately with a highly asymmetrical data network (i.e. a large downstream data pipe and many small upstream data pipes). This allowed CATV operators to offer high speed data services immediately without first requiring an expensive system upgrade. Also key was that it saw that the upstream and downstream communications could be on the same or different communications media using different protocols working in each direction to establish a closed loop communications system. The speeds and protocols used in each direction would be very different. The earliest systems used the
public switched telephone network The public switched telephone network (PSTN) provides infrastructure and services for public telecommunication. The PSTN is the aggregate of the world's circuit-switched telephone networks that are operated by national, regional, or local telep ...
(PSTN) for the return path since very few cable systems were bi-directional. Later systems used CATV for the upstream as well as the downstream path. Hybrid's system architecture is used for most cable modem systems today.


LANcity

LANcity was an early pioneer in cable modems, developing a proprietary system that was widely deployed in the U.S. LANcity, which was led by the Iranian-American engineer
Rouzbeh Yassini Rouzbeh Yassini ( fa, روزبه یاسینی), Ph.D., "Father of the Cable Modem", is an Iranian- American author, inventor, and engineer, who has gained an international reputation as a "broadband visionary" for his pioneering work in broadband ...
, was then acquired by
Bay Networks Bay Networks was a network hardware vendor formed through the merger of Santa Clara, California based SynOptics Communications and Billerica, Massachusetts based Wellfleet Communications on July 6, 1994. SynOptics was an important early innov ...
. Bay Networks was subsequently acquired by
Nortel Nortel Networks Corporation (Nortel), formerly Northern Telecom Limited, was a Canadian multinational telecommunications and data networking equipment manufacturer headquartered in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It was founded in Montreal, Quebec, ...
. Nortel at the time had formed a joint-venture with
Antec Antec, Inc. is a Taiwanese manufacturer of personal computer (PC) components and consumer tech products. Antec's principal products are computer cases and power supplies. Antec also offers PC cooling products, notebook accessories, and previous ...
called
ARRIS In architecture, an arris is the sharp edge formed by the intersection of two surfaces, such as the corner of a masonry unit; the edge of a timber in timber framing; the junction between two planes of plaster or any intersection of divergent a ...
Interactive. Because of contractual agreements with Antec involving this joint venture, Nortel spun the LANCity group out into the ARRIS Interactive joint-venture. ARRIS continues to make cable modems and
cable modem termination system A cable modem termination system (CMTS) is a piece of equipment, typically located in a cable company's headend or hubsite, which is used to provide high speed data services, such as cable Internet or Voice over Internet Protocol, to cable subsc ...
(CMTS) equipment compliant with the
DOCSIS Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification (DOCSIS) is an international telecommunications standard that permits the addition of high-bandwidth data transfer to an existing cable television (CATV) system. It is used by many cable televisio ...
standard.


Zenith homeworks

Zenith The zenith (, ) is an imaginary point directly "above" a particular location, on the celestial sphere. "Above" means in the vertical direction ( plumb line) opposite to the gravity direction at that location ( nadir). The zenith is the "high ...
offered a cable modem technology using its own protocol which it introduced in 1993, being one of the first cable modem providers. The
Zenith Cable Modem Zenith Cable Modem was one of the first proprietary cable modems. The two basic models are one operating at 500 kilobits per second (kbit/s), and the other at four megabits per second (mbit/s) with BPSK and approximately a 25% alpha. History The ...
technology was used by several cable television systems in the United States and other countries, including Cox Communications San Diego, Knology in the Southeast United States,
Ameritech AT&T Teleholdings, Inc., formerly known as Ameritech Corporation (and before that American Information Technologies Corporation), is an American telecommunications company that arose out of the 1984 AT&T divestiture. Ameritech was one of the sev ...
's Americast service (later to be sold off to
Wide Open West WideOpenWest (doing business as WOW!) is the sixth largest cable operator in the United States with their network passing 3,248,600 homes and businesses. The company offers landline telephone, cable television, and broadband Internet services. ...
after the SBC / Ameritech merger), Cogeco in Hamilton Ontario and Cablevision du Nord de Québec in Val-d'Or. Zenith Homeworks used BPSK (Bi-Phase Shift Keyed) modulation to achieve 500 Kbit/sec in 600 kHz, or 4 Mbit/sec in 6 MHz.


Com21

Com21 Com21 was an early pioneer in developing cable modem networks in the era before the standard DOCSIS was introduced for Internet access via cable television networks. The company filed for bankruptcy in 2003. The company Com21 Inc. was an America ...
was another early pioneer in cable modems, and quite successful until proprietary systems were made obsolete by the DOCSIS standardization. The Com21 system used a ''ComController'' as central bridge in CATV network head-ends, the ComPort cable modem in various models and the NMAPS management system using
HP OpenView HP OpenView is the former name for a Hewlett-Packard product family that consisted of network and systems management products. In 2007, HP OpenView was rebranded as HP BTO (''Business Technology Optimization'') Software when it became part of the ...
as platform. Later they also introduced a return path multiplexer to overcome noise problems when combining return path signals from multiple areas. The proprietary protocol was based on
Asynchronous Transfer Mode Asynchronous Transfer Mode (ATM) is a telecommunications standard defined by American National Standards Institute (ANSI) and ITU-T (formerly CCITT) for digital transmission of multiple types of traffic. ATM was developed to meet the needs of ...
(ATM). The central ComController switch was a modular system offering one downstream channel (transmitter) and one management module. The remaining slots could be used for upstream receivers (2 per card), dual Ethernet 10BaseT and later also Fast-Ethernet and ATM interfaces. The ATM interface became the most popular, as it supported the increasing bandwidth demands and also supported
VLAN A virtual local area network (VLAN) is any broadcast domain that is partitioned and isolated in a computer network at the data link layer (OSI layer 2).IEEE 802.1Q-2011, ''1.4 VLAN aims and benefits'' In this context, virtual, refers to a phys ...
s. Com21 developed a DOCSIS modem, but the company filed for bankruptcy in 2003 and closed. The DOCSIS CMTS assets of COM21 were acquired by
ARRIS In architecture, an arris is the sharp edge formed by the intersection of two surfaces, such as the corner of a masonry unit; the edge of a timber in timber framing; the junction between two planes of plaster or any intersection of divergent a ...
.


CDLP

CDLP was a proprietary system manufactured by
Motorola Motorola, Inc. () was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, United States. After having lost $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009, the company split into two independent public companies, Motorola ...
. CDLP
customer premises equipment In telecommunications, a customer-premises equipment or customer-provided equipment (CPE) is any terminal and associated equipment located at a subscriber's premises and connected with a carrier's telecommunication circuit at the demarcation po ...
(CPE) was capable of both PSTN (telephone network) and radio frequency (cable network) return paths. The PSTN-based service was considered 'one-way cable' and had many of the same drawbacks as
satellite Internet Satellite Internet access is Internet access provided through communication satellites. Modern consumer grade satellite Internet service is typically provided to individual users through geostationary satellites that can offer relatively high d ...
service; as a result, it quickly gave way to "two-way cable." Cable modems that used the RF cable network for the return path were considered 'two-way cable', and were better able to compete with the bi-directional
digital subscriber line Digital subscriber line (DSL; originally digital subscriber loop) is a family of technologies that are used to transmit digital data over telephone lines. In telecommunications marketing, the term DSL is widely understood to mean asymmetric dig ...
(DSL) service. The standard is in little use now as new providers use, and existing providers having changed to, the DOCSIS standard. The Motorola CDLP proprietary CyberSURFR is an example of a device that was built to the CDLP standard, capable of a peak 10
Mbit/s In telecommunications, data-transfer rate is the average number of bits ( bitrate), characters or symbols ( baudrate), or data blocks per unit time passing through a communication link in a data-transmission system. Common data rate units are mu ...
downstream and 1.532 Mbit/s upstream. CDLP supported a maximum downstream bandwidth of 30 Mbit/s which could be reached by using several cable modems. The
Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...
n ISP
BigPond Telstra Group Limited is an Australian telecommunications company that builds and operates telecommunications networks and markets voice, mobile, internet access, pay television and other products and services. It is a member of the S&P/ASX 20 ...
employed this system when it started cable modem tests in 1996. For a number of years
cable Internet access In telecommunications, cable Internet access, shortened to cable Internet, is a form of broadband Internet access which uses the same infrastructure as a cable television. Like digital subscriber line and fiber to the premises services, cable In ...
was only available in
Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mounta ...
,
Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/ Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a metro ...
and
Brisbane Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Queensland, and the third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of approximately 2.6 million. Brisbane lies at the centre of the South ...
via CDLP. This network ran parallel to the newer DOCSIS system for several years. In 2004, the CDLP network was terminated and replaced by DOCSIS. CDLP has been also rolled out at the French cable operator
Numericable Numericable was a major French cable operator and telecommunications services company. Numericable was originally created in 2007 from the merger between former competitors Noos and NC Numericable networks. Numericable Group SA was founded in Aug ...
before upgrading its IP broadband network using DOCSIS.


DVB/DAVIC

Digital Video Broadcasting Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) is a set of international open standards for digital television. DVB standards are maintained by the DVB Project, an international industry consortium, and are published by a Joint Technical Committee (JTC) ...
(
DVB Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) is a set of international open standards for digital television. DVB standards are maintained by the DVB Project, an international industry consortium, and are published by a Joint Technical Committee (JTC) o ...
) and Digital Audio Visual Council (DAVIC) are European-formed organizations that developed some cable modem standards. However, these standards have not been as widely adopted as DOCSIS.


IEEE 802.14

In the mid-1990s the
IEEE 802 IEEE 802 is a family of Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) standards for local area networks (LAN), personal area network (PAN), and metropolitan area networks (MAN). The IEEE 802 LAN/MAN Standards Committee (LMSC) maintai ...
committee formed a subcommittee (802.14) The IEEE 802.14 Working Group used WalkingDog.com as its web site. to develop a standard for cable modem systems. IEEE 802.14 developed a draft standard, which was ATM-based. However, the 802.14 working group was disbanded when North American multi system operators ( MSOs) instead backed the then-fledgling DOCSIS 1.0 specification, which generally used
best-effort service Best-effort delivery describes a network service in which the network does ''not'' provide any guarantee that data is delivered or that delivery meets any quality of service. In a best-effort network, all users obtain best-effort service. Under ...
and was IP-based (with extension codepoints to support ATMDOCSIS RFI 1.0-I01 (March 26, 1997)
(See section 6.2.3 for the DOCSIS ATM codepoint. See sections 6.1.2.3, 6.2.5.3, 6.4.7, 9, and 9.2.2 for DOCSIS 1.0 QoS mechanisms.)
for QoS in the future). MSOs were interested in quickly deploying service to compete for
broadband Internet access Internet access is the ability of individuals and organizations to connect to the Internet using computer terminals, computers, and other devices; and to access services such as email and the World Wide Web. Internet access is sold by Inte ...
customers instead of waiting on the slower, iterative, and deliberative processes of standards development committees. Albert A. Azzam was Secretary of the IEEE 802.14 Working Group, and his book, ''High-Speed Cable Modems'',Albert A. Azzam, ''High-Speed Cable Modems'' describes many of the proposals submitted to 802.14.


IETF

Although the
Internet Engineering Task Force The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) is a standards organization for the Internet and is responsible for the technical standards that make up the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP). It has no formal membership roster or requirements an ...
(IETF) generally does not generate complete cable modem standards, the IETF chartered
Working Groups A working group, or working party, is a group of experts working together to achieve specified goals. The groups are domain-specific and focus on discussion or activity around a specific subject area. The term can sometimes refer to an interdis ...
( WGs) that produced various standards related to cable modem technologies (including 802.14, DOCSIS,
PacketCable PacketCable network is a technology specification defined by the industry consortium CableLabs for using Internet Protocol (IP) networks to deliver multimedia services, such as IP telephony, conferencing, and interactive gaming on a cable televisi ...
, and others). In particular, the IETF WGs on IP over Cable Data Network (IPCDN) and IP over
Digital Video Broadcasting Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) is a set of international open standards for digital television. DVB standards are maintained by the DVB Project, an international industry consortium, and are published by a Joint Technical Committee (JTC) ...
(DVB) produced some standards applicable to cable modem systems, primarily in the areas of
Simple Network Management Protocol Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) is an Internet Standard protocol for collecting and organizing information about managed devices on IP networks and for modifying that information to change device behaviour. Devices that typically ...
(SNMP) Management Information Bases ( MIBs) for cable modems and other networking equipment that operates over CATV
networks Network, networking and networked may refer to: Science and technology * Network theory, the study of graphs as a representation of relations between discrete objects * Network science, an academic field that studies complex networks Mathematics ...
.


DOCSIS

In the late 1990s, a consortium of US
cable operators Cable television is a system of delivering television programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This contrasts with broadc ...
, known as "MCNS" formed to quickly develop an open and interoperable cable modem specification. The group essentially combined technologies from the two dominant proprietary systems at the time, taking the
physical layer In the seven-layer OSI model of computer networking, the physical layer or layer 1 is the first and lowest layer; The layer most closely associated with the physical connection between devices. This layer may be implemented by a PHY chip. The ...
from the
Motorola Motorola, Inc. () was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, United States. After having lost $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009, the company split into two independent public companies, Motorola ...
CDLP system and the
MAC layer In IEEE 802 LAN/MAN standards, the medium access control (MAC, also called media access control) sublayer is the layer that controls the hardware responsible for interaction with the wired, optical or wireless transmission medium. The MAC sublay ...
from the LANcity system. When the initial specification had been drafted, the MCNS consortium handed over control of it to
CableLabs Cable Television Laboratories, Inc. (CableLabs) is a nonprofit corporation promoting innovation as a research and development lab founded in 1988 by American cable operators. System operators from around the world are eligible to be members. Th ...
which maintained the specification, promoted it in various standards organizations (notably SCTE and
ITU The International Telecommunication Union is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for many matters related to information and communication technologies. It was established on 17 May 1865 as the International Telegraph Union ...
), developed a certification testing program for cable modem equipment, and has since drafted multiple extensions to the original specification. While deployed DOCSIS RFI 1.0 equipment generally only supports best efforts service, the DOCSIS RFI 1.0 Interim-01 document discussed QoS extensions and mechanisms using
IntServ In computer networking, integrated services or IntServ is an architecture that specifies the elements to guarantee quality of service (QoS) on networks. IntServ can for example be used to allow video and sound to reach the receiver without interru ...
,
RSVP RSVP is an initialism derived from the French phrase ''Répondez s'il vous plaît'', literally meaning "Respond, if you please", or just "Please respond", to require confirmation of an invitation. The initialism "RSVP" is no longer used much in ...
, RTP, and Synchronous Transfer Mode (STM)
telephony Telephony ( ) is the field of technology involving the development, application, and deployment of telecommunication services for the purpose of electronic transmission of voice, fax, or data, between distant parties. The history of telephony is i ...
(as opposed to ATM). DOCSIS RFI 1.1DOCSIS RFI 1.1-I01 (March 11, 1999)
(See section 8 and Appendix M.)
later added more robust and standardized QoS mechanisms to DOCSIS. DOCSIS 2.0 added support for S-CDMA PHY, while DOCSIS 3.0 added
IPv6 Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) is the most recent version of the Internet Protocol (IP), the communications protocol that provides an identification and location system for computers on networks and routes traffic across the Internet. I ...
support and
channel bonding In computer networking, link aggregation is the combining ( aggregating) of multiple network connections in parallel by any of several methods, in order to increase throughput beyond what a single connection could sustain, to provide redunda ...
to allow a single cable modem to use concurrently more than one upstream channel and more than one downstream channel in parallel. Virtually all cable modems operating in the field today are compliant with one of the DOCSIS versions. Because of the differences in the European
PAL Phase Alternating Line (PAL) is a colour encoding system for analogue television. It was one of three major analogue colour television standards, the others being NTSC and SECAM. In most countries it was broadcast at 625 lines, 50 fields (25 ...
and USA's
NTSC The first American standard for analog television broadcast was developed by National Television System Committee (NTSC)National Television System Committee (1951–1953), Report and Reports of Panel No. 11, 11-A, 12–19, with Some supplement ...
systems two main versions of DOCSIS exist, DOCSIS and EuroDOCSIS. The main differences are found in the width of RF-channels: 6 MHz for the USA and 8 MHz for Europe. A third variant of DOCSIS was developed in
Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the n ...
and has seen limited deployment in that country. Although interoperability "was the whole point of the DOCSIS project," most cable operators only approve a very restricted list of cable modems on their network, identifying the 'allowed' modems by their brand, models, sometimes firmware version and occasionally going as far as imposing a hardware version of the modem, instead of simply allowing a supported DOCSIS version.


Multimedia over Coax Alliance

In 2004, the Multimedia over Coax Alliance (MoCA) was established to develop industry standard for the connected home, using the existing coaxial cabling. Initially developed for in-home networking with MoCA 1.0/1.1, the MoCA standards has continued to develop with MoCA 2.0/2.1 in 2010 and MoCa 2.5 in 2016. In 2017, Multimedia over Coax Alliance introduced MoCA Access specification, based on the MoCA 2.5 standard, suitable for addressing broadband network access in-building using coaxial cabling. MoCA Access extends MoCA 2.5 in-home networking to fit operators and ISPs that are installing fiber-to-the-basement/drop point (FTTB/FTTdp) and want to use the existing coax for connection to each apartment or house."


Multimedia terminal adapter

With the development of
voice over Internet Protocol Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), also called IP telephony, is a method and group of technologies for the delivery of voice communications and multimedia sessions over Internet Protocol (IP) networks, such as the Internet. The terms Internet t ...
(VoIP) telephony, analog telephone adapters (ATA) have been incorporated into many cable modems for providing telephone service. An embedded ATA is known as an ''embedded multimedia terminal adapter'' (E-MTA). Many cable TV service providers also offer VoIP-based telephone service via the cable infrastructure (
PacketCable PacketCable network is a technology specification defined by the industry consortium CableLabs for using Internet Protocol (IP) networks to deliver multimedia services, such as IP telephony, conferencing, and interactive gaming on a cable televisi ...
). Some high-speed Internet customers may use VoIP telephony by subscribing to a third-party service, such as
Vonage Vonage (, legal name Vonage Holdings Corp.) is an American cloud communications provider operating as a subsidiary of Ericsson. Headquartered in Holmdel Township, New Jersey, the organization was founded in 1998 as ''Min-X'' as a provider of resi ...
, MagicJack+ and NetTALK.


Network architectural functions

In network topology, a cable modem is a
network bridge A network bridge is a computer networking device that creates a single, aggregate network from multiple communication networks or network segments. This function is called network bridging. Bridging is distinct from routing. Routing allows ...
that conforms to
IEEE 802.1D IEEE 802.1D is the Ethernet MAC bridges standard which includes bridging, Spanning Tree Protocol and others. It is standardized by the IEEE 802.1 working group. It includes details specific to linking many of the other 802 projects including t ...
for
Ethernet Ethernet () is a family of wired computer networking technologies commonly used in local area networks (LAN), metropolitan area networks (MAN) and wide area networks (WAN). It was commercially introduced in 1980 and first standardized in 1 ...
networking (with some modifications). The cable modem bridges Ethernet frames between a customer
LAN Lan or LAN may also refer to: Science and technology * Local asymptotic normality, a fundamental property of regular models in statistics * Longitude of the ascending node, one of the orbital elements used to specify the orbit of an object in spa ...
and the coax network. Technically, it is a modem because it must modulate data to transmit it over the cable network, and it must demodulate data from the cable network to receive it. With respect to the
OSI model The Open Systems Interconnection model (OSI model) is a conceptual model that 'provides a common basis for the coordination of SOstandards development for the purpose of systems interconnection'. In the OSI reference model, the communications ...
of
network design Network planning and design is an iterative process, encompassing topological design, network-synthesis, and network-realization, and is aimed at ensuring that a new telecommunications network or service meets the needs of the subscriber and ope ...
, a cable modem is both physical layer (layer 1) device and a
data link layer The data link layer, or layer 2, is the second layer of the seven-layer OSI model of computer networking. This layer is the protocol layer that transfers data between nodes on a network segment across the physical layer. The data link layer p ...
(layer 2) forwarder. As an
IP address An Internet Protocol address (IP address) is a numerical label such as that is connected to a computer network that uses the Internet Protocol for communication.. Updated by . An IP address serves two main functions: network interface ident ...
able network node, cable modems support functionality at other layers. Layer 1 is implemented in the
Ethernet PHY In the seven-layer OSI model of computer networking, the physical layer or layer 1 is the first and lowest layer; The layer most closely associated with the physical connection between devices. This layer may be implemented by a PHY chip. The ...
on its LAN
interface Interface or interfacing may refer to: Academic journals * ''Interface'' (journal), by the Electrochemical Society * '' Interface, Journal of Applied Linguistics'', now merged with ''ITL International Journal of Applied Linguistics'' * '' Int ...
, and a DOCSIS defined cable-specific PHY on its HFC cable interface. The term ''cable modem'' refers to this cable-specific PHY. The
Network Layer In the seven-layer OSI model of computer networking, the network layer is layer 3. The network layer is responsible for packet forwarding including routing through intermediate routers. Functions The network layer provides the means of tran ...
(Layer 3) is implemented as an IP host in that it has its own
IP address An Internet Protocol address (IP address) is a numerical label such as that is connected to a computer network that uses the Internet Protocol for communication.. Updated by . An IP address serves two main functions: network interface ident ...
used by the network operator to maintain the device. In the
transport layer In computer networking, the transport layer is a conceptual division of methods in the layered architecture of protocols in the network stack in the Internet protocol suite and the OSI model. The protocols of this layer provide end-to-e ...
(layer 4) the cable modem supports UDP in association with its own IP address, and it supports filtering based on
TCP and UDP port In computer networking, a port is a number assigned to uniquely identify a connection endpoint and to direct data to a specific service. At the software level, within an operating system, a port is a logical construct that identifies a specific ...
numbers to, for example, block forwarding of
NetBIOS NetBIOS () is an acronym for Network Basic Input/Output System. It provides services related to the session layer of the OSI model allowing applications on separate computers to communicate over a local area network. As strictly an API, Ne ...
traffic out of the customer's LAN. In the
Application Layer An application layer is an abstraction layer that specifies the shared communications protocols and interface methods used by hosts in a communications network. An ''application layer'' abstraction is specified in both the Internet Protocol Su ...
(Layer 7), the cable modem supports certain protocols that are used for management and maintenance, notably
Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol The Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol (DHCP) is a network management protocol used on Internet Protocol (IP) networks for automatically assigning IP addresses and other communication parameters to devices connected to the network using a cli ...
(DHCP),
SNMP Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) is an Internet Standard protocol for collecting and organizing information about managed devices on IP networks and for modifying that information to change device behaviour. Devices that typically ...
, and
TFTP Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP) is a simple lockstep File Transfer Protocol which allows a client to get a file from or put a file onto a remote host. One of its primary uses is in the early stages of nodes booting from a local area netwo ...
. Some cable modems may incorporate a router and a DHCP server to provide the LAN with IP network addressing. From a data forwarding and network topology perspective, this router functionality is typically kept distinct from the cable modem functionality (at least logically) even though the two may share a single enclosure and appear as one unit, sometimes called a
residential gateway A residential gateway is a small consumer-grade gateway which bridges network access between connected local area network (LAN) hosts to a wide area network (WAN) (such as the Internet) via a modem, or directly connects to a WAN (as in EttH), ...
. So, the cable modem function will have its own
IP address An Internet Protocol address (IP address) is a numerical label such as that is connected to a computer network that uses the Internet Protocol for communication.. Updated by . An IP address serves two main functions: network interface ident ...
and
MAC address A media access control address (MAC address) is a unique identifier assigned to a network interface controller (NIC) for use as a network address in communications within a network segment. This use is common in most IEEE 802 networking te ...
as will the router.


Cable modem flap

Cable modems can have a problem known in industry jargon as "flap" or "flapping". A modem flap is when the connection by the modem to the head-end has been dropped (gone offline) and then comes back online. The time offline or rate of flap is not typically recorded, only the incidence. While this is a common occurrence and usually unnoticed, if a modem's flap is extremely high, these disconnects can cause service to be disrupted. If there are usability problems due to flap the typical cause is a defective modem or very high amounts of traffic on the service provider's network (upstream utilization too high). Types of flap include reinsertions, hits and misses, and power adjustments.


Known vulnerabilities

In January 2020, a vulnerability affecting cable modems using
Broadcom Broadcom Inc. is an American designer, developer, manufacturer and global supplier of a wide range of semiconductor and infrastructure software products. Broadcom's product offerings serve the data center, networking, software, broadband, wirel ...
chipsets was disclosed and named Cable Haunt. Security researchers say that the vulnerability affects hundreds of millions of devices. Exploits are possible because of the use of default credentials in the
spectrum analyzer A spectrum analyzer measures the magnitude of an input signal versus frequency within the full frequency range of the instrument. The primary use is to measure the power of the spectrum of known and unknown signals. The input signal that most co ...
component of the modem (mostly used for debugging purposes) accessible through a network
port A port is a maritime facility comprising one or more wharves or loading areas, where ships load and discharge cargo and passengers. Although usually situated on a sea coast or estuary, ports can also be found far inland, such as H ...
which is open by default in the vulnerable models.


See also

*
Cable modem termination system A cable modem termination system (CMTS) is a piece of equipment, typically located in a cable company's headend or hubsite, which is used to provide high speed data services, such as cable Internet or Voice over Internet Protocol, to cable subsc ...
(CMTS) * Cable telephone * Internet access with a cable modem *
List of device bandwidths This is a list of interface bit rates, is a measure of information transfer rates, or digital bandwidth capacity, at which digital interfaces in a computer or network can communicate over various kinds of buses and channels. The distinction can ...
*
Triple play (telecommunications) In telecommunications, triple play service is a marketing term for the provisioning, over a single broadband connection, of two bandwidth-intensive services, broadband Internet access and television, and the latency-sensitive telephone. Tripl ...
*
HomePNA The HomePNA Alliance is an incorporated non-profit industry association of companies that develops and standardizes technology for home networking over the existing coaxial cables and telephone wiring within homes, so new wires do not need to be ...


References


Further reading

* *


External links

* {{Telecommunications Digital cable Cable television technology Modems Internet access