I've been using this modem for at least 5 years now and I have never encounter a single issue. I've been through multiple ISPs and moved houses. This is very solid and stable. Most of the issues I had was with the ISP. I didn't need a 1GB speed. So this works out perfectly just fine for me.

ARRIS (SB6190) - Cable Modem is small, efficient, and delivers my 300 Mbps flawlessly. Great quality and great price. Technical support was good. Not more difficult than any other modem to install. The xfinity install app failed to recognize MAC number on this and two previous modems but with xfinity technical support on the phone, no such problem existed. Xfinity has nothing to gain and makes the switch from rented to privately owned modem confusing with the app. The xfinity app implies a problem with the modem when in fact the app fails to recognize the modem's MAC address. Thank you, Jim

Edit: I've gotten some performance numbers and some consistency testing done. My service is 75 down and 5 up. I get 91 down and 6 up with this modem. I've also performed extensive testing and have gotten the same results +/- a few percentage points even at peak usage times. In practical use I'd occasionally get delays/echo in voip calls and streaming video would occasionally lose quality for a few seconds to a minute, especially between 7 and 9 in the evening. No longer a problem. ----------------------------------- Original review: This cable modem offers 32 downstream 'channels' and 8 upstream channels. Your download info gets spread over 32 'lanes' and your upload data gets spread over 8. Like lanes in a road, not enough of them coupled with heavy traffic can result in erratic performance and loss of quality of service. You share your local loop / node with other people in your neighborhood, and perhaps other neighborhoods if you live in a rural area. What this means is that your data and everyone else's is on a single shared medium, split up into these 'channels'. Your cable company will 'provision' or tell your modem which ones to use. 32 is realistically as high as they're going to go with this technology. Many areas already support 16 or 32. All will go to 32 before too much longer. Most customer owned/retail modems support 4x4 or at best 8x4. That means that you're cut out of using 28 or 24 download 'lanes' and up to 4 upload lanes. The modem doesn't jump around if your lane gets clogged up, you're stuck with the ones originally provisioned to the modem when it boots. The technology used has an acronym called "docsis" which handles modem/network management, encoding of your data, and channel handling among other things. Docsis 2.0 is an old end-of-life technology that has minimal management ability, cant use lots of channels and it takes separate resources for the cable company to provide you service, which makes their costs higher, which makes your costs higher. Docsis 3.0 is the current tech and what this modem supports. It allows the cable company to remotely identify problems with your equipment and correct it, and allows them to look at whats happening when you call them. It supports bazoodles of channels and offers excellent speeds and smooth quality of service. Modems are rated for total speed which is based on channels, however this 'ideal performance' figure is rarely ever seen even in standard lab conditions, let alone on the 25 year old cable in your house and to the connection at the street. These speeds also presume a completely uncongested network with nobody else using it and the full complement of channels the modem supports. You won't be getting any of that. Will this make your 50Mb/s connection go faster? I wouldn't count on it but many people report getting higher than their paid-for rate with a higher channel modem when their area is provisioned for high channel counts. What it'll do is give you a better shot at always having 50Mb/s and keeping your 'ping' times, gaming response times and netflix video quality consistent. The Arris modem is also the stock rental modem most ISP's use, so they're familiar with it. You can save a few bucks with different brands, but be prepared for more problems on activation and during problem situations. Many ISP's have "end of life"d modems with docsis 2.0 and 4/8 download channel modems although they're allowing retail/owned modems to continue being used, even though it creates problems for them and those customers aren't getting always getting the most out of their service. Docsis 3.1 will eventually show up next year and offer even better speeds, performance and manageability but these high tier docsis 3.0 modems will continue to remain in service for quite some time, perhaps 4 or even 5 years. When you're looking at renting a modem for $70-100+ a year, its a no-brainer to buy one. Unless you're subscribing to extremely high bandwidth services (400+Mb/s) you can get away with an SB6183 for a little less but I'm not sure that's a favorable economy since you'll be saving less than a buck a month over the life of the modem. I looked hard at the Netgear CM600 and the SB6183 and decided to go with the 6190. I bought an SB6141 a little over 3 years ago and its still offering me fine service. However my area (which is a little rural on the edge of the suburbs) has been set up for 32/8 channel support and I'm seeing my speeds and quality getting a bit rough especially in the evenings. One of my friends just upped their service to a high tier and got an SB6190, so now I have modem envy. I'm looking forward to the same experience as when I went from a 6121 (4x4) to the 6141 (8x4), which was an immediately measurable and noticeable improvement in consistency and quality of service. This modem, like many others, was a little mature upon its initial release late last year and it takes ISP's a while to process firmware updates and make them available. So while earlier reviews have had some legitimate complaints, the modem is now pretty solid on Comcast and most other providers. I'll update the review with some numbers once I have it installed. I thought I'd give the benefit of my research on this to save others time. Frequently modem choices get limited to "but what I have now works" (similar argument made for horses when cars came out) or "but I only have 75Mb/s service and my 5 year old modem will do 120 under ideal conditions" (my steam engine will get my car to 70MPH eventually"). Its a little more involved than that.

Works great! I had to boot the modem with a quality cable and router separately and call my cable company, but it works! Also I needed a laptop or pc to activate the modem with my ISP. A litte tough to figure out but if your tech savvy it's a great deal!

The signal to noise ratio on these reviews is unbelievable. I have no possible hope that my review could influence the overall score of this device, but I can tell you that if you are one of the lucky people who happen to stumble upon reading my review, please consider my review in the proper context. Part of my trade is a network engineer, but I do not want to bore anyone with technical details. I will try to explain things in terms that are very straightforward: Many cable modems are built with the same or similar components which are developed by chip manufacturers. This particular modem is built using a chip family made by Intel with the brand name "Puma" which is a low cost chip which integrates a lot of the hardware necessary to build a cable modem onto a single chip. Several manufacturers use these chips to build modems, and different models by the same manufacturer may use different vendors' chips. For the most part this is a good thing; the hardware cost is reduced and consumers can enjoy a better product with more consistent and reliable performance. Sometimes though this is not the case. Intel Puma chips have several severe problems which have not been addressed, and it is further unclear if the problems are even able to be addressed. The first problem is a security issue which allows anyone on the Internet to block your cable modem from sending or receiving traffic. The second is an issue where in certain common circumstances the cable modem will have problems sending or receiving data in a timely manner. Both of these problems can lead to temporary complete loss of service or can appear to simply be slow or unreliable service. Because people have come to expect that their home Internet service is occasionally slow and unreliable, these fundamental faults are often overlooked as trouble. Likewise certain types of testing which do not provoke the problems reveal a modem which appears to perform admirably in most circumstances, and so many are left with an overall favorable impression. I have no doubt that the people leaving good reviews about this modem are sincere; but I also have no doubt that they have experienced trouble and overlooked problems with their cable modem as problems with their connection or service provider. Sadly, answering the question regarding which alternate product one should purchase is equally difficult because it is highly dependent on your cable provider. It could be that a 24x8 Broadcom modem such as the Netgear CM600 is the best choice, but it could also be that a SB8200 DOCSIS 3.1 modem is the best choice. But there is one thing for sure: the SB6190 is to be avoided.

My Cox Internet service got upgraded to 500Mbps from 300Mbps for the same price but my old modem Arris SB6183 (16 Channel) did not support it. So I had to choose to buy a new DOCSIS 3.1 or a (32 Channel) DOCSIS 3.0 so I went to get the SB6190 for $70. After replacing my old modem now I get above 590-600Mbps, for $70 this modem was a good bang for the buck!

nice product work with my provider