Comcast is doing some kind of work in our neighborhood today.

cypherstream · 2025-04-22T11:47:23+00:00

Comcast came into our development in 2022. Prior to that we were a single cable company neighborhood. They came in with Arris label midsplit gear and harmonic nodes. Today there’s a few trucks and also a pickup from “fiber network services, inc.”. The guy down the street from me took off the amp pedistal lid and was banging on sometihing really hard. Metal on metal for sure, almost like pounding a rod in the ground or something. Wonder what they are up too? It’s an established new cable plant. Could it be FDX upgrades already?

bigcoda

MacLeech Or capacity upgrades, equipment replacement, node splits, fiber changes/repairs, coax changes/repairs, video work, frequency changes, or a dozen other things.

My neighborhood is all underground, but I have seen Comcast doing a lot of upgrades to this aerial area were it runs down a main street. I noticed a lot of areas were the cables are just rolled up and hanging. I don’t know if this is the new or old equipment or if it’s Low-Split, Mid-Split, of FDX?

Aceq2jot

bigcoda Not sure either but I can tell you a lease time on DHCP Lease Expire Time (IPv4):0d:1h:2m of two hrs. max is a pain in the rear as every two hrs. I loose my WIFI connection. Thankfully I am retired and the wife works from home but is hardwired so she does not have problems. But i am finding it a pain as there are bills I have tried to watch the passage of in live Time in the MN leg and losing WIFI every couple of hrs. is really annoying.

With the outages I normally only notice them as my Cameras go down during the outages and I get no recording of the local wildlife in the back.

Aceq2jot

bigcoda The big white box to the left looks like the nodes they have strung up in my area which are new, the box to the right is for Xfinity WIFI i believe it is a booster and the black thing is where they store extra fiber optic cable incase of a break in the line they can just extend it and fix the line again I believe. All of my area is mostly above ground and all this stuff was last spring. But yesterday I did notice they are putting orange conduit into the ground and running lines a half mile from where there is a small non descript building with no windows, a large generator a few antennas and cooling fans for Liebert A/c Units on top. I was told this is the main hub in my area that all the lines feed into like a Data Center. Which in turn makes a lot of sense as the original 3m corporate offices are close by and they had two 3M plants across the street that are now gone. But they would have been a user of Comcast fiber optic the same as the State of MN which has had comcast fiber for well over a decades as the orange conduit runs around inside the tunnel system linking the building on the Capitol Complex.

MacLeech

badtlc4 None of that other than massive repairs would require so many regular outages and that would most likely have visible performance issues. Upgrades and node splits dont require that many outages, at least in my area.

You’d be amazed. Relocating or replacing hub equipment or fiber tends to cause many regular outages. I’ve done multiple projects to move and/or upgrade routers, transmitter/receiver chassis, modulators, CMTSs, etc. and all of their connections within a hub to clear space for future projects. I’ve also been involved in outside fiber relocates were runs down a street were moved across the street or from aerial to underground over multiple nights to make space for future construction.

Tito79

Comcast ran new coaxial and fiber along my main street its only mid split so far

Tito79

Is it true comcast is ripping out all coax and running fiber?

hex0101

Tito79 Absolutely not. Coax will get DOCSIS 4.0 for symmetrical speeds. Some newer deployments are EPON (fiber to the home).

cypherstream

Tito79 We have a joker in the room!

Comcast isnt, but my smaller cable operator is installing FTTH now about a mile away from me.
I think Comcast is too big to go FTTH. WAY too many areas to cover. Too many route miles of fiber to buy. Not enough labor to install it all.

Smaller ops have less area to cover, so less to buy. Also Comcast is publicly traded so if they can get coax to work and customers to be happy, increase apru, sustain revenue streams and growth, thats all that matters.

cypherstream

cypherstream I come home from work today and there’s lines painted on the roads. Green, white, blue, yellow…. Some white dashes, arrows a Y+B designation in white.

Only active project I know is SECV’s FTTH expansion. We already have their coax, Comcast coax. We are a Verizon LEC and that’s just copper. I didn’t hear of them restarting FIOS in PA.

Donut417

Tito79 From my understanding Comcast is only running Fiber in select areas. Primarily from my understanding in areas where they took government money and it was required for them to run Fiber. Outside of that they committed to Docsis. Though I think with Docsis 4 they will be able to to more competitive if anything.

cypherstream think Comcast is too big to go FTTH. WAY too many areas to cover. Too many route miles of fiber to buy. Not enough labor to install it all.

I think they could upgrade to FTTH. BUT it’s likely to be a long and drawn out process. If I were Comcast Id upgrade areas that have other FTTH providers with Fiber and leave the rest with Docsis.

badtlc4

Donut417 I can say this is not 100% true everywhere. Xfinity built out a brand new service area with 100% FTTH EPON in Spring Hill KS (5 miles from me) 2 years ago. It was 100% funded by Xfinity and no local, state or federal tax money/grants/subsidies were provided to Xfinity.

Is this the exception to the rule? I can’t say. My neighborhood and areas directly around me within 2 miles are all getting new xfinity builds as we speak and they are all HFC. My HFC service was constructed about 4 years ago but there is a lot of new residential construction around me. So Xfinity is constantly building out around me with HFC.

Tito79

They Decreased the upload now to 100 Mbps strange

telcodad

Tito79 They Decreased the upload now to 100 Mbps strange

Yeah, back in June people noticed the speeds changed from 1000/300 and 2000/300 to 1000/100 and 2000/250:

https://broadbandbulletin.com/d/2364-5-year-price-guarantee/138

cypherstream

Tito79 Yeah we think they bit off more than they can chew.

Ultibeam

Tito79 The prior uploads were too generous, for mid-split. They probably figured it wouldn’t be sustainable with unlimited data.

EnasYorl

Donut417 If it is a Greenfield then it’s “Fiber First” and Brownfield is HFC

Tito79

EnasYorl well here they ran all fiber on the poles the finished it off with coax

cypherstream

Tito79 it’s probably when it was DESIGNED vs when it was INSTALLED. Our area was all new 2022-2024 build outs. Could have been designed in 2018 for all we know… then permits, then covid, supply and labor constraints, then finally “new” HFC installed in 2022-2024 but designed years prior.

SECV’s fiber to the home system is being designed with a shorter window between walkout and deployment, but they have a lot less plant miles to cover (and privately owned) vs a larger slower moving giant like Comcast.

dishrich

There was a story on our local news this week re: Comcast’s work permits being revoked in a nearby Village, after several residents complaints that Comcast caused damages to property around their homes…as well as like complaints in another nearby village:
https://foxillinois.com/news/local/frustrations-with-comcast-continues-around-central-illinois-riverton-residents-speak-out

https://www.wandtv.com/news/sherman-residents-and-leaders-fed-up-with-damage-caused-by-utility-provider/article_2b55e304-ce40-4ed3-813c-8699856c3508.html

This actually surprised me, as I couldn’t find much of anything re: Comcast expanding into these villages. BUT the thing that really surprises me, is the fact the incumbent local cable company Casscomm, just finished up overbuilding BOTH systems with FTTH; they are in the process of doing this for their ENTIRE service areas & shutting down the coax plant. They also just did upgrades on all speeds this month: (interesting they just happen to do this right as Comcast is coming into town & they were LONG overdue when you look at the previous speeds!)
https://home.casscomm.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/Fiber-speed-upgrade-PR-9.1.25.pdf

While both villages have a population of approx 3500 (Riverton) & 4600 (Sherman) & are immediately adjacent to existing Comcast plant, it just seems insane that Comcast is doing brand, new copper plant, ALONGSIDE A FTTH COMPETITOR! Still, I’m guessing they’re going to get into a price war with Casscomm, since Cc’s pricing is a little on the high side, particularly for new FTTH service: (note these prices do NOT include any router/wifi; if you want Cc to supply it, you’ll get Plume at $4/1st pod, $6/each added pod - pricing in link below)
100/100 - $60
500/500 - $75
1G/1G - $100
2G/2G - $150
https://home.casscomm.com/service-areas/sherman/

And knowing how most non-tech consumers are, while I’m sure Comcast will get some low-hanging fruit, I just don’t see how they’re going to get THAT high of take rate, now that Casscomm is all FTTH.

cypherstream

dishrich We spoke about it before but yeah we were shocked Comcast spent so much time and labor installing HFC. Oh well, the companies in our area they have been overbuilding have FTTH or are in the process of building FTTH. Blue Ridge, SECV, Armstrong, etc…

Even Glo Fiber in State College just announced a Comcast overbuild.

Its $5 a month MORE expensive to take a Comcast DOCSIS plan with the new 5 year price guarantee, WITH ACH Autopay discount vs SECV fiber with symmetrical speeds and 2-3ms latency.

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