Cox Cable / Static IP / New Router

[Matt Graham]

From: Derek Trotter <expat.arizonan at gmail.com>
> Since they [the ISP] already know what cable modem you're using,
> why do they also require a NIC [behind the cable modem] to be
> registered before it can be used?

IIRC, the original reason was money.  The ISP would allow the cablemodem to
transmit to 1 NIC with 1 MAC addr, and if you wanted additional devices to be
able to talk to the cablemodem, you had to pay the ISP more.  ISPs didn't make
nearly as much money doing this as they thought they would, because
NAT/IP-Masqing are relatively easy to do.

They may retain some language in their contracts/TOS/whatever that say "You're
allowed to connect ONE DEVICE to this network".  If they've got that language,
they have a way to dump any customer they don't like who's ever used more than
1 network device at a time through their service.

-- 
Matt G / Dances With Crows
The Crow202 Blog:  http://crow202.org/wordpress/
There is no Darkness in Eternity/But only Light too dim for us to see