XB7 vs XB8 Gateway Use Case

Take heed and I hope this helps

others. So, I wanted the fastest data speed I could get in my area (2000 mbps) and was told I needed to migrate to the XB8 Gateway. After activation, it became clear that the XB8 range was at least half of the XB7 and the connectivity jumped up and down like a Duncan Yo-Yo.  Not acceptable as I needed speed and reliability for work. I proceeded

to change out to another XB8 thinking the one I had was bad to no avail. To be fair, the speed TO the XB8 was great (2200) but the speed out was a paltry 400-600 and as mentioned cut out frequently even when I activated 2 Pods with it. Pods are only as good as the signal they can grab and there wasn’t much for them to grab onto. The Xfinity chat bot process wasn’t helpful. I proceeded to exchange again to the XB7 and was still subscribing to the 2000 Mbps service which turns out is the best option. Here’s the facts as I experienced them. While the XB7 can RECEIVE 2000 Mbps and greater it can only output a max of 1000. Even with that, my coverage area doubled vs the XB8 and I was achieving 700-800 mbps consistently. I also attempted to downgrade my service to the 1000 plan considering that was the speed the XB7 maxes out on but surprisingly the speed output was much lower (300-500) vs being on the 2000 plan.  Kudos to the Port Murray NJ  Xfinity team for their understanding and patience as they exchanged 3 gateways over a 4 day period ( thanks Pat!). So- what I ended up with is paying for the 2000 mbps plan and an XB7 which gives me optimal

coverage and reliability vs the XB8.   Live and learn. XB8 not ready for prime time.