That has been my experience as well (only from the RF side) and I would
believe this was a design choice. The ISP usually wants to keep control
over the firmware versions of the CM for various technical/support reasons
versus having consumers mess with the firmware.
Its a design choice but not one that always works out well.
Customers that bring their own modems that aren't on a "certified" list,
end up with a device that the provider may not have ever seen. Then, if
you run into an issue with the modem that can be fixed with a firmware
issue (some vendors have issues that they cannot fix - rhymes with
netgear) then the MSO has to work with the maker of that modem, even
though they may have never had any interactions with them, get the
certificate and firmware for that modem and upgrade customer owned devices
- possibly turning them into bricks. I'd rather allow customers to turn
their own modems into bricks.
sam
