Effect of modem on sync speed

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I'm aware the BT Home Hub isn't the best quality modem, but it was only yesterday that I realised how dodgy it really is. I tried reconnecting my trusty old Voyager 2000 and for some reason, downstream noise dropped from 46dB to 38dB. This has increased my sync speed by about 1Mb from around 5,500kbps to 6,500kbps. Since I have aquired two homehubs, I checked on each for consistency. They both gave a 46dB attentuation, opposed to the 38dB of the voyager. I didn't really believe the modem itself could affect the sync speed, or at least not by this much! If the Home Hub is so bad why to BT insist on continuing to ship it to the millions?

Just a bit of info

 

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It's an attenuation, not "downstream noise".

My bad...sorry.

It's possible they're both right though. If the HH uses a lower bit rate overall but uses the upper frequencies, and the Voyager uses more bits in a tighter frequency range, you'd expect a lower average attenuation (higher frequencies are attenuated more).

Fair point. Although the end result from the Voyager is a noticeably higher (and more stable) speed.