man! any p2p i've had seems to let me download for a while and then my cable modem drops connection (i can tell by the lights going dead and then cycling again). i called my isp to see what they're policy is on p2p... they said no restrictions. they told me it's a firewall issue. after turning of windows firewall and another that i have the problem still occurs. any suggestions?
win xp
2.1ghz
best data cable modem connected via ethernet
10/100 intel
no router

i did that ... i changed from toshiba cable modem to this one. my connection is steady too... i can play games for hours on either modem but the minute i try to get on a peer to peer, that's when the problems occur.

If you are using LW 4.6 then there appears to be a bug with the UPnP. It will be fixed with the next minor release. If you're using another p2p app then I don't know.

doesn't matter what p2p i'm using... although some let me stay logged on longer than others

It doesn't sound like a reliable modem then. Try to reduce your p2p's demand on your system & modem. Disable ultrapeer cap. under Speed. Set your downlds for auto-clear. Don't use the Resume button on any files. Don't download too many files simultaneously. Don't do simultaneous searches. Keep upload bandwidth to 70-80% or less. Disable OOB Searching. Perhaps even resuce your download bandwidth to 70-80%. Don't do anything with LW until it settles down, perhaps aftr 20 mins. Just some ideas to help prevent stress on your connection.

well fotunately i workj for a local cable company installing cable, telephone and internet systems. i think what you're refering to is a homerun line dedicated for data transfer. that really shouldn't matter unless you have a loop system with splitters behind the wall plate or in the eves outside. sometimes those splitters are old and aren't able to support frequencies of 1000mhz which leads to problems.
anyway... i think i figured out the problem but i'm not quite sure. i went into the options and configured everything as suggested i even reduced the number of ports available. so far so good but only time will tell. got my fingers crossed.