C7000-100NAS randomly drops internet connection

So I have been having the same problems as everyone else. Started about a month after I got the modem. I just RMA'd the thing after living with it for 5 months. New one has the same problems. BTW, Netgear made me pay to ship their faulty product back to them. My current workaround is putting the Netgear router into bridged mode to act as a modem only, then using my old asus router to do all the routing. Works A LOT better. I don't know how much longer this will last, but I'll update if it starts going back to crap.  I think the Netgear router has a HUGE buffer in it to make up for lack of hardware. This is causing MAJOR ping Spikes.  I was having an average of 500 to 1000ms hops on a trace route before. Now I'm back to under 30 on most hops. I'm hoping this continues to work out, but if I wasn't going to be using a combo modem I would have stuck with my existing and slower setup. I'm on time warner. My lines and connections have been checked by a two pros (one who was an independent) and are good. The fact that my old docsis 2.0 modem runs faster right now says way too much. Disappointed, and Pissed at the wasted money. NETGEAR please replace this POS with something else, make a firmware that works, or give us a CHEAP upgrade path.