Patent ID: 7668098

Claim:
A method, comprising: calculating, by a device that shares one or more upstream channels with other devices, an available bandwidth of a first upstream channel based at least on upstream channel bandwidth data transmitted from a remote system, wherein the remote system comprises a cable modem termination system (CMTS); determining by the device, whether based, at least in part on particular data, an upstream channel data transfer rate can be improved over a current data transfer rate of the first upstream channel from the device to the remote system, wherein the particular data comprise the device's transmit queue capacity data, the upstream channel bandwidth data transmitted from the remote system, or both; wherein determining whether the transmit queue capacity data indicates that the transmit queue is full comprises: monitoring a first number of receipt failure indicators transmitted from the CMTS; comparing the first number of receipt failure indicators to a second number; and indicating the transmit queue is full if the first number is larger than the second number; and improving by the device, if the upstream channel data transfer rate can be improved, the upstream channel data transfer rate based, at least in part, on the particular data.