Some flashing of the activity light, even when the computer is not in use, is completely normal. In most cases, this traffic consists of ARP broadcast packets. ARP, which stands for Address Resolution Protocol, is used by TCP/IP to translate IP addresses into their associated MAC addresses, a process which is required for network operation. (The DOCSIS and Ethernet hardware in devices like cable modems, digital cables boxes and the cable modem termination system use MAC addresses when transferring data)
On a few older modems, some additional flashing is caused by multicast packets. Although these are usually filtered out, some modems flash their activity light before the application of the filter.
Once one has established their machine is virus free and firewalled, there is no reason to be concerned about flashing of the activity light. The downstream has *plenty* of capacity to handle this traffic, so it should not cause any performance degradation.
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Submitted by Bichon 
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by Lex Luthor
last modified: 2004-08-20 17:06:03 |
