?The 2017 CES saw various vendors introduce their first cable modem based on Broadcoms DOCSIS 3.1 BCM3390 chipset. Netgears CM1000 was one of the first out of the gate, though it didnt come with future-proof features such as the dual Ethernet ports in the Linksys CM3132.

Today, Netgear is launching the CM7800 cable modem router (being marketed under the Nighthawk X4S tag) based on the same platform as the CM1000. I wont go into the details of DOCSIS 3.1 and its advantages (already covered in the CM1000 launch article). The router and network processor segment is more interesting. Based on the AC3200 specifications, the CM7800 appears to be heavily based on the Broadcom BCM93390 reference design (PDF) where the BCM3390 itself is the network processor with the integrated switch, and the Wi-Fi features enabled by the BCM4366 4x4 802.11ac Wave 2 radio. The BCM3390 integrates a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor. The BCM4366 has the proprietary QAM extensions to enable up to 550 Mbps for each 5 GHz spatial stream and up to 250 Mbps for each 2.4 GHz one (hence, the AC3200 tag). The CM1000, as mentioned earlier, is limited to 1 Gbps practically even if the ISP supports, say, 2 Gbps. However, the CM7800s integrated switch ensures that the unit can support 1 Gbps+ speeds to the coax link (assuming ISP support) using just the wired LAN ports.