There really aren’t that many modem/router combos out there you can actually flash with open source firmware.

Router? Sure, no problem.

Modem? Outside of some very niche Fritzbox devices and others listed on OpenWRT Table of Hardware

There really just aren’t that many.

So, fine. I will use a proprietary modem.

I will put it into bridge mode, let it decode the DSL analog signals into ethernet and feed that into a router of my choice.

Question is: Which modem?

I don’t want two devices heating up my shelf. I just want a tiny modem that converts analog to digital into an RJ45 and then let’s the router do its thing.

Does such a magical device exist, because my search on this front has proved largely fruitless

  • InEnduringGrowStrong@sh.itjust.works
    12·
    6 months ago

    Honestly, I’d just use whatever the ISP provides.
    Sure, it’s not open source and it kinda sucks… But I mean, if you don’t trust the ISP modem, you can’t trust the rest of their infrastructure either anyway, so it’s kinda moot.
    At least that way you have a vague chance of having a modicum of support when shit breaks.

    If it can’t be put into bridge mode, it probably has some sort of DMZ function where it basically does port forwarding for any/all possible ports.
    Double NAT isn’t as bad as it sounds these days.

    Now to your question…
    They exist, they’re mostly targeted at ISPs though, so might be a harder find than other things.
    They might also be older, as basically all customers also want their ISP to provide Wi-Fi, which a bridge modem won’t.
    Anyway,
    You’ll have to know what DSL were talking about, there’s… ADSL, ADSL2+, VDSL, VDSL2, etc

    One old-ass model we used to use back in the day was… a Siemens 5200, but that’s ADSL2 at best, definitely not VDSL.

    • tetris11@feddit.ukOPEnglish
      1·
      6 months ago

      Siemens 5200

      That’s a chunky house warmer, let alone shelf warmer!

      I can understand that ISP’s need to protect their security (through obscurity) so that no one’s going around cloning their neighbors analog signals to score free internet… but surely the actual hardware to do the tone pairing / channel matching analog-to-digital-magic-mumbo-jumbo does not need to be the size of a brick?

      In the spirit of people cutting open Nintendo Wii’s shearing down the chip and making compact versions[0], has no one isolated the hardware on a modem, chucked out the routing stuff, and compacted the whole device to be no bigger than a USB stick?

      0: https://www.tomshardware.com/video-games/nintendo/meet-nintendo-kawaii-the-new-smallest-wii-build-that-fits-on-your-keychain

      • Ghoelian@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        4·
        6 months ago

        The fibre modem my ISP uses is pretty small, about the same size as one of those small unifi switches, but it still feels like there’s almost nothing in it.

        I have taken apart the fibre modem of a different provider before, which was just a small PCB no larger than a raspberry pi and a fibre extension cable.

  • martini1992@lemmy.ml
    3·
    6 months ago

    Netgear DM200? Supports openwrt to if you really want. You’ll have to buy used now though.

  • fruitycoder@sh.itjust.works
    2·
    6 months ago

    Unfortunately modems have the issue that they are made to be provisioned, configured, and owned by the ISP. At least that’s how most DOCSIS setups I’ve seen work.

    The only hope I’m seeing (I’m also wanting to do this) is running my own CMTS. I found a service (https://github.com/cablelabs/os-provisioning is the only opensource tool I’ve seen before) but I am still trying to figure out a reasonable cost way to connect that server to the actual network (so far bladerf sdr is ny best hair brained idea, which is really only cost effective because I want to play with 5g too). The last bit of luck I have is that my ISP isn’t actually doing firmware updates on my modems, so if I connected them to my Internet lab network, provisioned my custom OS and firmware, and then connected it back to the ISP I can get their DOCSIS config. In theory at least 😅

    Netgear has modems that have their OS and firmware in nice packages with build instructions at least. ARIS’s older modem code is out there too but a pain compared to get.

    You technically could use that same sdr as the modem on your ISPs network BUT because it’s actually RF the FCC regulates it (for good reason I guess lol).

    • tetris11@feddit.ukOPEnglish
      2·
      6 months ago

      oh well. One day someone might make an ooen source docsis3 compliant modem…