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Originally Posted by Ciderpress
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Also what the hell does "boost your signal" mean? What?? Isn't it just a signal that is either on or off?
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Signal strength is very much variable. It'll be measured in decibel-millivolts, plus for a strong signal, negative for a weak one. Both incoming and outgoing signals will automatically adjust themselves, within the limits of the devices, according to the needs. For example, if you live in an area with a lot of line noise, your modem diagnostic might show a transmit volume in the high +++ range with a receive volume in the --- range, indicating your transmitter is screaming but it can hardly hear the incoming signals. This is *really* common in rural areas or on high-traffic nodes.
Could be your ISP noticed weak incoming signals from your address and sent you a modem that can yell louder--albeit, this is unusual and most the time the ISP will wait for a modem to fail. Optionally the old modem might've been incompatible with some network or software upgrades, or it's just plain old no longer supported. 10 years is a long time for a cable modem.