wow im feeling pretty dumb right now, because i think i primarily answered my own question in this post
a combination of reading this other thread in the forum here, as well as some cisco documentation on modem provisioning has got me thinking ive found my solution.
i believe a lot of my issues were due to double NAT. i had seen collisions reported on my gateway, and an obscene amount of data going through 2.4ghz band for some reason while the radio was disabled. i was already aware this would be problematic so i did all i could think of:
- disabled both 2.4/5ghz wireless radio
- set wireless access control to allow and added no ip/mac addresses
- connected nothing else to gateway but router
- even tried to disable the dhcp on the gateway at one point. i figured my router had dhcp so what did i need that for since this would just be a modem? (this is a bad idea to anyone reading still but unaware, i very quickly made my modem useless and needed to reset it to get back to work)
reading another thread i realized what id been wanting this whole time was bridge mode, but in netgear its not the easiest thing to find / understand. so, yeah. after all that research and effort i just needed to tick a checkbox. lol.
NEXT UP: the optimal frequency range / lost packets. yea i totally need to have cox reprovision my modem. cisco lays it out pretty bare. its strange that the configuration web utility allows me to set a starting frequency (which i didnt set, my gateway/modem finds this on its own every time) that is quickly overwritten and forced to a problematic one.
just like .. dont give me the option?
OH AND ANY COX STAFF READING THIS, I HATE CALLING PLEASE HELP ME PROVISION MY MODEM REMOTELY 😞
anyways, thanks for reading. again? i hope my blunder can help someone possibly in a similar situation googling for answers
