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Is the USB port on a cable modem as fast as the ethernet port?

The transfer speed of USB 1.x is 12Mbps, USB 2.0 has extended this to 480Mbps. Most common ethernet adaptors are rated at either 10 or 100Mbps (you can also get cards which do 1000Mbps over ethernet though these are not common in the home market).

So to answer your question... ethernet is faster than the older USB ports, but the new USB ports which have started appearing lately are considerably faster.

Edit : Good site all about Ethernet standards.

Edit 2 : My last post as a Golden member 🙂
 
It shoulden't matter. USB is 12mbps, and a cable modem dosen't transfer any more than 10mbps max. Personaly, I prefer the more traditional ethernet connection, but USB would work just as well as far as speed is concerned.

The advantage to the ethernet connection comes in to play when you hook your cable modem to you a router to share the connection with all the computers on the network using the router. True, windows can do this, but the computer that is sharing the connection needs to be on whenever you want to use it. If you went USB, you woulden't be able to share over a router, while with ethernet, its incredibly simple.
 
Like Derango said, the cable modem will be limited by the slower transfer(<12Mbits/s) anyway so either USB or Ethernet is a good choice. I would rather use an ethernet connection cause it just makes things simplier.
 
USB v1 has 12Mbps max, shared among all USB ports. If This is the only USB port in use, that's fine, but if you have a USB mouse, USB printer, USB scanner, USB digicam like I do, if you try using them all at the same time, or even just a couple at the same time, your bandwidth to your internet connection could be inhibited. It also takes more CPU, as mentioned already. Also, NIC cards are one of the cheapest componants you can buy for your computer, so there really is no reason not to have one.

Just my opinion.....

Cigar
 
USB can only average about 2mbit, and that in no way compares to the speed of cable modem or a good nic. Get a good nic, USB nics are crap.

Kyle
 
Given that a cable modem won't use more than 1mbit per second and USB provides 12, there are no bandwith issues. The only things that should concern you are CPU util. and convenience. If its gonna be easier, use the USB connection - in the end, you won't notice the difference.
 


<< Given that a cable modem won't use more than 1mbit per second and USB provides 12 >>



Well you are wrong, 1 mbit (1000, as defined by isp) is equal to 125 KB/s , I see a lot more cable does in the region of 200KB/s and upwards.

An NIC is a better way to go.
 


<< in the end, you won't notice the difference. >>



this is an incorrect statement. USB sucks CPU like there's no end. Even with my 1600+ high-drain USB devices cause lag, especially with other USB devices.
 
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