ggarabigie wrote:
I've called my ISP (Charter) tech department and literally no one knows anything technical about any of this stuff. They've scheduled a "tech" to come out and look at the cable box and modem but I'm sure they won't know a single thing about this stuff either.

This doesn't surprise me at all, and if you mention the word "bufferbloat" to the field tech, you're likely to just get a deer-in-the-headlights stare back. It's a complex issue, and not many will be well-versed in it. And even if they are, troubleshooting it is not particularly simple. The tech should be able to check and verify RF characteristics at your home to make sure it is within spec and possibly correct any signal issues, but beyond that, I don't expect there is much they can do.

ggarabigie wrote:
So if this is an outside home issue, I'm screwed. I did see that the firmware on my modem is slightly old and Netgear suggests called my ISP to have them update but Charter Spectrum says they cannot and will not update anything outside of their own equipment. So now I'm stuck in a black hole because Netgear says to update the firmware on your modem, call your ISP and when I call my ISP they say they don't do that.

I'm not familiar with Charter's network or what sort of devices they support, but you might want to ask about support for DOCSIS 3.1 modems. The DOCSIS 3.1 specification mandates use of Active Queue Management (AQM) which is specifically intended to address bufferbloat problems. DOCSIS 3.0 supports AQM, but doesn't require it, so they may or may not use it. Upgrading to something that supports DOCSIS 3.1 might help, but only if the problem is on the cable network to begin with. If the problem is even farther upstream, well... it gets even more complicated.

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