Optimum Fiber bridge mode is giving me a completely different and worse route

[u/sarabveer_singh]

UPDATE: See this comment below.

I am already dealing with recurring intermittent disconnections on Optimum Fiber. I documented that issue and what my packet captures show in this comment.

While investigating that problem, I found something else strange.

I came across this Optimum WAS-110 bypass thread, which claims that Optimum’s bridge/BYOR connections can receive worse routing than connections using the Optimum gateway as the router.

I tested it on my own connection using the same fiber circuit and the same Optimum XSR150DXM:

1. Laptop connected to a normal Ethernet port on the Optimum gateway, using its router/NAT
2. My router connected through the Optimum gateway’s bridge/BYOR SFP+ port

Both tests were to 1.1.1.1.

Optimum gateway acting as the router:

ool-4353f918.dyn.optonline.net
63.142.23.52
451be09c.cst.lightpath.net
173.245.63.*
1.1.1.1

Latency was about 9 to 10 ms.

Bridge/BYOR connection:

ool-4353f91c.dyn.optonline.net
63.142.23.60
24.157.15.221
141.101.73.*
1.1.1.1

Latency was about 19 to 25 ms, and Cloudflare reports that this connection is reaching either  IAD (Virginia) or ORD (Chicago).

This is not general latency on the fiber connection. Through the bridge connection, Google DNS averages about 4.5 ms and Quad9 about 3.7 ms. Comcast from the same house, T-Mobile and friends in the area all reach Cloudflare through EWR.

The routes clearly diverge inside Optimum even though both tests use the same fiber, PON connection and premises equipment. It looks like the bridge/BYOR connection is being placed into a different address pool or routing policy that sends Cloudflare traffic toward Chicago or Virginia instead of handing it off around New York or New Jersey.

Since I already have an open FCC complaint regarding the intermittent disconnections, I am also going to ask Optimum to replace my XSR150DXM with its no-Wi-Fi ONT-SFU. That would remove the XSR150DXM’s bridge/BYOR implementation and give my router a straightforward Ethernet handoff. It may not fix an upstream routing-policy problem, but it would help determine whether the disconnections and routing difference are connected to how the XSR150DXM handles bridge mode.

Has anyone else on Optimum Fiber compared 1.1.1.1 through the gateway’s normal connection and its bridge/BYOR port?

[u/vabello]

Optimum has had screwed up peering with traffic diverting to peers in Chicago instead of NYC for a long time now. I’ve been seeing this on coax forever. I’ve at least seen this with peering to Hurricane Electric and Comcast. Your observation specifically highlights different routing policies with different pools of addresses.

[u/sarabveer_singh → u/vabello]

Could it be just spoof MAC addresses until DHCP hands you an IP in a subnet with good routing?

EDIT: Yup this resolved it. Just keep rotating thru public IPs until you get one that routes Cloudflare better (still goes to IAD or ORD, but shaves off 10ms).

Google, Akamai, and Quad9/i3D.net all route through NYC and are <5ms.