P-971M User’s Guide

Chapter 2 Connection Screen.

26

You will see 

IP Complete

 if your P-971M has successfully negotiated a DHCP connection 

with the CMTS and set your IP address.

You will see 

TOD Established

 (

T

ime

 O

f 

D

ay) if your cable operator’s time server has 

communicated with the P-971M to establish the current time and date used for event logging. 

You will see 

Security Established

 if baseline privacy was requested in the configuration file 

and initialized by the P-971M.

You will see 

Registration Complete

 if your P-971M has received authorization from the 

CMTS to forward internet packets. Authorization must first be requested in the configuration 
file.

2.1.3  Boot State 

When downloading the configuration file and booting, your P-971M passes through several 
negotiation stages with the CMTS. All communication steps: TFTP, DHCP Offer/Response, 
and Time Server must complete in order for the configuration to be successful. TFTP is the 
download protocol used to install the configuration file. 

If there is a problem making a TFTP connection with your CMTS, you will see the message 

Waiting for TFTP

. If the P-971M does not receive a DHCP offer from the CMTS you will 

see the message 

Waiting for DHCP Offer

. Once the P-971M has responded to the DHCP 

offer it again waits for a response from the CMTS, if it does not receive a response you will 
see the message 

Waiting for DHCP Response

. If the cable operator’s time server does not 

respond your will see the message 

Waiting for Timer Server

. If the download and 

installation of the configuration file succeeds you will see the message 

Operational

. 

Your cable modem must receive an offer of a DHCP IP Address from the CMTS and respond 
to that offer in order to set your IP Address. First your cable modem is 

Waiting for DHCP 

Offer

, if the offer is received by your cable modem it responds 

Waiting for DHCP Response

to the CMTS. Once a response is received your IP Address is set and can be viewed under the 

CM IP Address

 section of this screen or in the 

Software

 status screen. Note that the DHCP IP 

Address setting must be completed successfully in order for your cable modem to download 
the configuration file.

2.1.4  Configuration File 

This is the name of the cable modem configuration file downloaded from your cable 
operator’s CMTS using the TFTP protocol. This is a binary format file which must be 
DOCSIS 2.0 compliant (see RFC 2132 for additional information) A sample configuration file 
is included in the appendix.