Quick Question on a Cable Modem / High Speed Internet

[saber800]

I recently got a high speed cable access and I was wondering if the PC/Activity light should be constantly blinking even if all the computers are off? If all computers are off, there shouldn't be much activity except for DHCP packets (i guess). I have a Motorola Surfboard Cable Modem hooked up to a Netgear MR814 Wireless Router with 3 pc's hooked up to it. I have no problems with internet access; I just wanted to know if this is normal for the PC/Activity light to be always blinking.

 

[Nebor]

Yup, my router\cable modem\nics are always blinking. I only assume my router isn't convertly launching DOS attacks on innocent peoples.

 

[saber800]

Yeah, its wierd why the PC/Activity light is constantly blinking. I was wondering for bandwidth purposes. Could it be robbing me of some bandwidth?

 

[imgod2u]

Probably not, most likely those lights are merely probes, i.e. the modem broadcasting across the line "anyone there?" and the router saying "yes".

 

[DaTT]

I'm not sure if it robs you of bandwidth or not, but it is normal for it to be blinking....your ISP is constantly connected to your MODEM. It should only be the "receive" light that is blinking (because you obviously can't send with the PC off).

And out of curiosity, you people who live in the states, do you have to buy your own cable MODEMs, or does the ISP supply them?

 

[MDE]

Either situation. You could buy it or rent for $10 a month (my ISP at least). Not worth renting in my book.

 

[mbackof]

These lights on network cards came around with the advent of network on support where in the BIOS you can set your computer to boot up when it receives certain network commands. The cards are running in a sleep mode and show the data link information to the network. Its probably not a big deal, especially if you are using a hardware firewall for your broadband, but you should go into the power settings in the BIOS and disable the support for network on events if you don't plan to use them.

 

[rahvin]

Cable is a shared pipe to the node. You see all network traffic on your node. You can packet sniff your entire node if you desired.

 

[saber800]

Thanks for the replies. It helped a lot.

 

[PanzerIV]

Mine often blinks like crazy as well. I know it's the network traffic of other users in my node but I keep an eye on my router to make sure none of the individual connections aren't blinking in conjunction with the modem when I'm not downloading or uploading anything.

Sure, I realize occassionaly it will as per normal network activity but I am referring to a steady stream as if I was uploading or downloading when I'm not doing anything. That would clue me in one of my machines was compromised but as of yet with two firewalls running that hasn't ever occurred.

 

[Texun]

A lot of what you see is overhead, the modem and HE talking to each other about settings, frequency, power and noise levels, etc. It's normal unless it is dead on solid. Blinking is not cause by people in your node using their modem..... unless they happen to be sniffing your computer.