I think this story just exposed the myth that chipset in modem must match chipset in DSLAM. I have never found that to be the case and is not an infallable rule one which to base a purchase.

DrT

I had another go at hooking the 7700 up with the same results - 1000kbps missing at the same SNR compared with my existing Netgear.
So I decided to ring Billion to see what they thought about its performance.
We discussed the lower sync speed (18xx) the 63.5 attenuation and the 5.4 snr that the Billion was reporting and the fact that it was dropping its connection every 10 minutes or so. The help line tech said that this was probably as good as it could do on my line and that I should return it as not fit for purpose.
I thanked him for being honest and realistic and am now waiting for an RMA from Broadbandbuyer.

In reply to a post by DrTeeth:

I think this story just exposed the myth that chipset in modem must match chipset in DSLAM. I have never found that to be the case and is not an infallable rule one which to base a purchase.

DrT

It isn't entirely a myth. It seems to have originated on these forums, as it is definitely the case that it is best on O2/Be to have a Broadcom-based router to match their Broadcom DSLAM line cards. That's because Broadcom incorporate an extension to the INP spec in both, and Be use that extension. This improves performance on O2/Be connections.

I don't think any other consumer ISPs or non-Broadcom routers use that extension.

I agree with you that in other setups matching is often not the best solution.