[ale] So, Comcast says 8-16ms to their first hop is... OK?

Thu Sep 4 17:48:37 EDT 2025

My UI looks a little different (UniFi OS 4.3.6 / Network 9.4.19), but those settings should be ok.  This is an example of what I see on the dashboard for my Comcast connection:

I don’t have any custom SLAs setup yet; this is a new install. At the moment, my SLAs are set to “Auto”.

/Raj W.

From: <neal at mnopltd.com>
Date: Thursday, September 4, 2025 at 4:45 PM
To: Atlanta Linux Enthusiasts <ale at ale.org>
Cc: Raj Wurttemberg <rajaw at c64.us>
Subject: Re: [ale] So, Comcast says 8-16ms to their first hop is... OK?

Thanks for the reply.   So, since you have a UDM pro, somebody, before me, setup a Custom Verification rule: 

This might have been the company that installed security cameras.   Does this look remotely sane for Comcast?  (75.75.75.75 is Comcast DNS)  I have reverted the UDM to use the Auto SLA test to see what happens. 

So, in general I'm hearing Comcast Business still uses a shared coax in many places, and yup, it might suck getting to that first hop. 

regards, 

Neal

On 2025-09-04 16:29, Raj Wurttemberg via Ale wrote:

We have the fault tolerant UDM Pro Max setup (main and "shadow") in our offices, and we have AT&T and Comcast.  AT&T is the primary and is always rock-solid.  I see the Comcast connection fail a few times during the week, so it is only used as a backup connection. I like it that the UDM Pro lets me know when there are internet issues.

I too see about the same hop times as you do on AT&T and Comcast. Looking at my UniFi console now, I see that Comcast had six "high latency" alerts today.... None for AT&T.

/Raj W.

From: Ale <ale-bounces at ale.org> on behalf of Neal Rhodes via Ale <ale at ale.org>
Reply-To: Atlanta Linux Enthusiasts <ale at ale.org>
Date: Thursday, September 4, 2025 at 1:08 PM
To: <ale at ale.org>
Cc: <neal at mnopltd.com>
Subject: [ale] So, Comcast says 8-16ms to their first hop is... OK?

We've been chasing why the church Unifi UDM Pro router is several times a day alerting that the Comcast Business Internet connection has gone down. 

I did some pathping (kinda like MTR) tests yesterday, and typical times to 8.8.8.8 from the back of the Comcast router, eliminating our local router and lan are about 16ms. 

Of that, 8-14ms is just the local Comcast router getting to its first hop.    

My AT&T Uverse is about 3ms to the first hop, and I understood that to be normal. 

I ping the Comcast Account manager, and here is the response:

Based on the findings, a lot of businesses/churches on the shared coax network in that area experience capacity issues which impacts reliability and performance.  To solve this issue, I'd suggest a complete network overhaul, which we could setup and manage.  

The first step would be migrating to a dedicated network.  Comcast would build out a dedicated fiber connection to the church to guarantee network uptime and speed consistency.  To guarantee wifi distribution/quality we would install a managed Meraki Device, with a new switch and Aps throughout the building. 

Comcast would invest $11,789.43 to run the fiber line ( no cost to the church), and the monthly cost for everything would be estimated in the 2k-2.5k per month.

Really?  Comcast Business Internet is that bad?  And it's ok? 

FYI, I have looked on what we could do to change the threshold in the Unifi router to relax the times and we can't find any such. 

regards, 

Neal  

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