Cable Modem feedback

[OrganicOzarks]

So the cable company showed up today, and said they are getting feed back to the system. It has been going on for about a year now. So that being said is there a way to block feedback to their system? They checked it here, and put some "padder" on it which they said made it perfect. Although at the time there was nothing running. So is there anything I can do so that I don't have the cable company poking around my house?

 

[rives]

Are you running electronic ballasts? Some of the older ones are notorious for creating rf noise. You can check and make sure that everything is well grounded and that you don't have any cabling problems that have compromised the shielding on the cable. Is your house reasonably new or has the electrical service been upgraded? Is the grow lighting running off of the main or a sub-panel?

 

[Toes.]

I just read this...

Signals leak into the cable system through consumer-owned devices, through the in-home wiring, the cable drop, and the distribution cable.

So, ballasts, T.V. monitors, wireless land line telephones, old wiring, even your computer itself.

If you have all of your computer stuffs... modem, tower,speakers, wires, printer, etc... all jam packed into a corner under your desk... that could do it too.

 

[OrganicOzarks]

Are you running electronic ballasts? Some of the older ones are notorious for creating rf noise. You can check and make sure that everything is well grounded and that you don't have any cabling problems that have compromised the shielding on the cable. Is your house reasonably new or has the electrical service been upgraded? Is the grow lighting running off of the main or a sub-panel?

I am running lumateks. The ones in use now are about 14 months old. I just got some new ones that I was actually in the middle of installing when I was interrupted by this. The wiring is from 1971, and the ballasts in question are running on a subpanel. I have some off of the main panel as well, but i do not believe these to be the culprits. Is there anything that I can do? Right now I am just going to shut down this part, and wait and see.

 

[rives]

I am running lumateks. The ones in use now are about 14 months old. I just got some new ones that I was actually in the middle of installing when I was interrupted by this. The wiring is from 1971, and the ballasts in question are running on a subpanel. I have some off of the main panel as well, but i do not believe these to be the culprits. Is there anything that I can do? Right now I am just going to shut down this part, and wait and see.

I believe that the older Lumateks were the worst offenders from what I recall, but I don't use them and don't have any idea when they improved the shielding. The reason that I asked about the sub-panel is because the grounds and the neutrals should be isolated from each other in a sub for reasons like this. They should have different busses (the attachment point) and the ground buss should be bonded to the enclosure. The two should only be bonded together at the main panel. Your place was wired prior to heavy electronic usage in homes, and may not be wired like this.

You should also check and see that the ground wire has a solid connection at the ground rod, and if it has been dry there for a long period (wrong season, I know) or the ground rod is not exposed to ambient moisture, a bucket of mildly salty water poured over it may work wonders.

 

[johnnybravo]

switch to dsl and sattelite???

 

[OrganicOzarks]

switch to dsl and sattelite???

Is there no feedback with DSL? I had thought about this so that there would be no interference.

 

[eyes]

i wouldnt sweat it too much. how long were u runing these till they had the "feedback" on there system? i recently had problems as well with cable. it was a problem on there end, on there line. There equipment does screw up or breakdown.

 

[johnnybravo]

Is there no feedback with DSL? I had thought about this so that there would be no interference.

for some reason dsl is not near as sensitive to rf interference. notice the difference between coax cable and your phone cord. coax is shielded to prevent interference issues.

 

[OrganicOzarks]

i wouldnt sweat it too much. how long were u runing these till they had the "feedback" on there system? i recently had problems as well with cable. it was a problem on there end, on there line. There equipment does screw up or breakdown.

They said the feedback had been going on for about a year. Which is about when I built out my new room. However they also said that in the past couple of days it has been the worst. Well my shit was in the middle of remodel so I know that was not me because nothing was turned on. I will add that my line was hook up to an old distribution box with about 10 other cables running to different places. None of them are "hooked" to anything anymore. I believe I just cut most of them, and they had bare ends.

So when he showed me the test on his meter I saw the spike. then he unhooked it from the distribution box, and I saw it go away. Now remember at this time the lights sharing this wall are unplugged, and any other lights are off because of their timers.

So Nothing of mine was running when he came, and the spike was there. In the beginning he said that a cut wire could do it. Well fuck, I have about 8 or 10. Once he "fixed" the problem he showed me the new signal strength from a computer, and it indeed had changed. It actually ended up exactly where he had said it should be.

So for now I am just going to wait and see. See if they want to come back out, or see if they don't.

I will say that when he said why he was there, and that it had been going on for about a year, I shit a massive brick.

They did upgrade our system about a year ago to the docsis so I am thinking that was when the problem may have been created.