ARRIS SURFboard SB6141-RB 8x4 DOCSIS 3.0 Cable Modem (Certified Refurbished)

Recieved item today and it seems to be working great. Installation and activation were simple with Comcast (shocking - I just said Comcast and simple in the same sentence).I added a photo of the modem next to a Wii for size reference. It's fairly compact and I appreciate it looks nice. I also added a picture of the speed test I took on my phone (IPhone 6); the first three were taken with this modem and the fourth was with my comcast rental modem. Speed seems to be faster with this than with the rental. I took the test on my desktop (iMac) and the speeds are pretty much the same as they are on my phone. We have quite a few things running on wifi in our house (2 iPhones, 2 iPads, iMac, Airbook, Xbox One, Wii, bluray Netflix player). There has been no noticeable lag and it all seems to be loading faster now. The old Comcast rental slowed down when more than three things were requiring wifi; that doesn't appear to be the case with this one.I guess I got lucky and didnt end up with a dud like some people did. If you get one that works or end up buying a new one, you won't regret it. Looks great and works great. I highly recommend the modem if you need something built for higher internet speeds.*This five star rating is STRICTLY for the modem and NOT the delivery service. We have prime and have never had a problem. This modem was delivered by a company called OnTrac. We have never heard of them so we decided to do a quick google search; the reviews on them are horrible. I was going to be out of the house for today's delivery, so I left a message on our door asking for the package to be held until tomorrow. I've done this with UPS and never had a problem with a rescheduled delivery. Apparently the person from OnTrac doesn't know how to read, or chose not to care about the package sitting on my front step unattended for hours. It got delivered anyway (even though the note was RIGHT THERE). Thankfully I was close to home when I got the alert from Amazon that it got delivered, so I was able to get home quickly to bring it inside. I would highly recommend being home (or let a neighbor know) and signing up for alerts about your delivery. From the reviews, they are known for crappy delivery service and sometimes they don't bother ringing the door bell. Zero starts for OnTrac delivery. I hope they just start shipping with UPS.

I was a bit worried about getting a refurbished modem. I've been selling, installing and managing network equipment for over ten years and I know that modems and routers take a beating from the average user via streaming. I took the dive and here's the story. (Why streaming is brutal on networking hardware, located at bottom of review for those new to the topic!)At first boot i had a tiny bit of an issue, but luckily, it was just a hick-up. Things were very fast after it's first reboot. I had a SB6121 I purchased new a year ago. I occasionally (once every month or so) had to reboot it and started to see times where performance would lack. Even if it was just for a short period, I figured perhaps I only have about a year of great performance left on my modem. I saw this on sale for 54.99. The sheer number of 5 star reviews and very little complaints blew me away and I took the risk. It was worth it. On speed test to the city next to mine, (which is faster than my own city somehow) my SB6121 would give me about 17-18Mb/s on a 20Mb/s connection. That's PRETTY great in my opinion. I speed tested the SB6141... I was red lining consistently at 21Mb/s on a 20Mb/s connection. It doesn't get better then that! Also, I apologize for not having the Upload speeds on me. I mostly stream, which is pretty much all Download speed related.This is worth it. If you're worried about streaming or the certified refurbished bit like I was, just get a warranty. I got a 3 year warranty straight from square trades site for about 12 dollars. At the end of the day, i spent about $70 after tax for this awesome modem and a 3 year warranty.Why Streaming is bad: Steaming uses a type of communication called UDP, which is one way communication. It ignores that you missed a packet concerning a pixel during a movie, because if you didn't get it, that frame and part of the movie is already over with. It just keeps throwing data down the line at you regardless of your modem and router being ready for it or not. This is a good thing though! Because you don't want the movie to pause just because of a missed packet you didn't even notice. It's bad for older equipment that needs a second though. It will over heat and age even faster due to this. There's no avoiding this if you stream. It's part of the nature of network hardware. I am generally VERY anti-warranty, but when it comes to networking hardware, I always get it. It's worth it every time as long as you're a streamer and you're not too lazy to make a claim when your hardware gets bad!! (Square Trade FTW) Also, having to power cycle / unplug and replug-in your modem and router on a regular basis is not normal behavior and most warranties will cover this.TL;DRStreaming is Great for us, but rough on hardware. And yes I pitched a warranty, but I find no guilt in it because I find it good advice in this case and I'm practicing what I'm preaching!Best of luck to you all in the networking world and if you're reading this, then YES! You totally should get this modem!

My review is based on a REFURBISHED modem not new. I do not know the history of the modem and what takes place in refurbishing these. Is it cosmetic or is there a battery of tests the modem are put through or maybe just a re-flash on the firmware ? What I can say is that mine was defective from the start and do not want to risk getting another defective modem.The modem power cycles itself many times per day. Over a few weeks time it would perform the reset several times per hour. The uncorrectable errors were extremely high. Research on the Internet revealed that the rebooting is a common problem. I swapped out power supplies to be sure it wasn't power related and the firmware was up to date. The power supply I substituted was better than the one supplied and we still had issues. Users cannot update the firmware as part of the DOCSIS standard the user has no control over a DOCSIS modem - the carrier is responsible for firmware updates. The only thing we can do is look at the status/info on the modem. So you can own it but not control it.I ordered a ZOOM modem to replace this one - I remember this company from the 80's / early 90's.Installing the ZOOM modem was a good choice - no more issues so the the ARRIS modem was the problemNote that there is not much you can do with a DOCSIS modem - you basically just plug it in and then register the MAC address with your carrier. In my case this required a phone call.Refurbished products can be a good buy - in this case it was a waste of my time performing the quality testing for the manufacture. This modem should hot have been resold in the first place as it was sent out defective.I remember now why I swore off this manufacture years ago and will not buy again under any circumstances based on pass and this experience.The Zoom modem was racked #2 to this modem in the reviews that I read on line. It is performing as tested in the reveiws and the documentation for the Zoom modem was far superior - the Zoom manufacture even included information about how to activate your modem and included contact phone numbers for the carriers and so forth - well written.I will review the ZOOM modem later after having it for a few weeks but already believe that it is a better product

Refurbished unit at a great price. Fast shipping, good packaging.Small unit that runs a little warm to the touch, so allow good ventilation. Unit has been performing well for a couple of weeks paired with a TP-Link Archer C9 router.Some reviewers mentioned issues or an inability to have these refurb units activated by their cable supplier due to registration to a previous owner. I have TWC and had absolutely no problem getting hooked up. Thank you Steve. I did mention it was a refurb unit from Amazon, not sure if that helped. As I have a land line with TWC I also had both units hooked up to a splitter (as per TWC instructions from their Web site, as I would keep their old modem for our land line phone), both modems powered up, and the new SURFboard modem hooked up to my computer via ethernet cable at the time i placed the call. TWC had to turn off their modem and transfer internet address to the new modem, so again, maybe this made the process a little easier from their end having both units hooked up at the same time.I didn't rate this unit at 5 stars as (1) the lights for power and Internet connection do not turn green as they are supposed to. They are white. All other lights turn blue, as they should, meaning a strong signal. This light quirk does not effect function and should not be an issue, but may indicate a less than thorough refurb. I don't know. If the unit bricks early, I will follow up. (2) The other minor quirk is, as others mentioned, how bright the lights are. As mentioned before, the unit runs warm even with adequate ventilation so can't be hidden away. A little masking or electrical tape over the light will tone it down.Solid 4 stars overall and 5 stars for function, if the unit lasts.BTW, I went from the TWC supplied modem/router (also Arris, a pretty good DOCSIS 3.0 unit) to separate units to get better WiFi range, upgrade to the new 802.11ac standard, and reduce my monthly cable bill. This modem paired with the TP-Link C9 did increase the range throughout my 1750 sf 2-level house with the modem located in the upstairs bedroom at one end of the house. I previously ran an AP to extend the range to the other end of the house. I used the OOKLA speed test app to evaluate the range. It was nearly the same up close, but lost less with the new setup as the distance from the router increased. In fact didn't lose much at all with the new setup at the furthest corner of the house. I only have TWC turbo (20/2 Mbps), so not unlimited access anyway, but couldn't test max signal throughput in my system. NetGear WiFI Analytics is also a good test app if you're interested in checking your place out. It will also read 2.4 and 5GHz band reception separately. FWIW, our home has a pretty open floor plan, so YMMV.As mentioned by others, these refurb units can be activated by your cable company if you get a tech able to do it.

I ordered this modem along with the TP-LINK TL-WRN841N Wireless N300 router on a Tuesday night and needed it by Friday morning at 8:00 (so I needed it by Thursday night). I was amazed when they were at my door Thursday morning. My cable company wanted to charge me $200 or $15/mo to rent this modem/router combo and was very pleased to find them on Amazon for less than $100 (it came out to around $98 if I remember correctly). I was going to order a new one from Arris, it appeared to cost only $3.00 more, but when I added it to my cart, it raised my expected price by $10! It took me a few minutes, but I finally realized that it was because OceanDirect Tech doesn't charge taxes. I'm (so far) very satisfied with my purchases, and would absolutely order this again.Pros:- The modem arrives in it's original packaging, shrink-wrap and all, and appears brand-new.- The price ends up around $12.00 less than the same model being sold by Arris- The shipping speed blew me away. I was apprehensive with the purchase, it seemed strange that a no-tax company (presumably overseas?) would be able to ship me this product within 1.5 days. It arrived on time and it great condition, along with the rest of my purchases.- The product is genuine, worked flawlessly with my cable/internet provider, and hasn't given me any issues.- Delivers my 100/15 connection flawlessly, and will be perfect for when I upgrade to a faster tier service.Cons:I have no cons at this time.Other Thoughts:I was going to order the same modem from Arris, it looked like it was only $3.00 more, but ordering from OceanDirect ended up saving me around $12-13. I still wish I could have found a cheaper modem, but this cost me less than half of what my cable provider wanted to charge me, and has provided solid performance.