You can… the BT shop will sell you a Vigor 130 modem with Openreach firmware (in the UK market this is only a modem, not a router) … but it uses ECI modem chipsets, so not ideal for longer VDSL lines to Huawei cabs as I have found out.
So you’re recommendation then for a modem?
As above… if ECI or Huawei short line then Vigor 130. If Huawei and longer line I would currently recommend the BT modem/router for best performance. However you can use the Vigor 130 just expect a 10% to 30% or so performance hit on longer lines.
That’ll start some sleepless night Simon. 
I don’t expect many folks actually know where their cabinet is, let alone what the hardware is.
I don’t have a BT router… with Plusnet. Also I don’t/can’t replace the Zyxel I currently use because it’s built in VPN allows me to link to the office. Not sure if I could purchase a BT HH(x) just to use as a modem… maybe but that sounds like a little messy.
I think I’ll get a Vigor 130 for a trial. I’d say it’s perhaps 300-400m to the local cabinet.
Mike you are not wrong… hence why I think we both recommend using ISP provided equipment…
But if you want to DIY, and I can understand the curiosity and urge to be independent… then first you need to understand your network and your connected cab and it’s type.
Here is a good place to start
https://kitz.co.uk/adsl/cabinet-lookup.htm
To answer the OP’s question I thought it may be useful to share the networking strategy I use.
I started out with a Virgin Superhub 3 modem/router in my lounge and my hi-fi is one floor up and across a staircase, so requires at least 15m of ethernet cable to connect. When I compared ethernet cable with wi-fi i was surprised to find that wi-fi was superior sound wise, indicating that electrical isolation was important in my set-up. My first step was therefore to install a network extender in my hi-if room, allowing me to connect the hi-fi room via wi-fi. I then installed an AQVox switch in the wi-fi room, so my Innuos server could connect to a cleaned up and retimed bit-stream via a short, high quality ethernet cable.
As someone pointed out, wi-fi isn’t only about hi-fi. In my installatIon I have hi-res audio, hi-res video, static and mobile network devices and devices that require good distance and wall penetrating capability. The Superhub3 was pretty hopeless in this regard, so I needed more than just Virgin’s flawed solution. I tried a number of different strategies including mesh networks but found the following to work best from both a networking performance and SQ standpoints. I switched the Superhub3 to modem only mode, maintaining connection compatibility with the Virgin Cable Network, and installed a TPLInk Archer AC5400 tri-band router. With 1 x 2.4GHz and 2 x 5 GHz bands I was able to dedicate a high speed 5GHz band to hi-fi, another to video and the slower but better distance and wall penetrating 2.4GHz band to all my other, less speed intensive connections. Each band on the Archer will serve 4 devices simultaneously, has highest allowable power transmitters and 8 beam forming antennae. With over 200 Mbps coming into the house, I get similar performance on the 2 5GHz bands and around 90Mbps on the 2.4GHz band, more than enough for all my devices. In my hi-fi room I installed a TP-Link dual band RE650 extender, with the 5GHz band set to receive stream from the dedicated router band, the 2.4GHz band disabled and output via the extender’s ethernet port into the AQVox. Both router and extender are set up using TPLink’s Tether app, so I can easily switch LEDs on and off, control which client has access to which band etc etc.
I use Synergistic Research cables to connect modem to router, extender to switch and switch to server. All SMPSs have been replaced with CHC DC3 LPSs and all devices mounted on anti-vibration mini-racks and wall mounts.
Performance is rock solid, with no drop-outs and the UI runs with the speed of a local device, despite having to handle art work from over 2000 files and 1000 ‘Qobuz favorites’. SQ is stunning, with power supplies, anti-vibration measures, improved cabling and the high performance router and extender all bringing significant improvements.
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Well obviously Plusnet is BT, albeit it operates relatively separately from BT Retail and their latest router is the ‘Hub Zero’ which is a relative good performer albeit rather basic, but it does I believe use a Huawei modem chipset.
Before others ask, & for info
The BT ‘Smart’ Hubs (HH6) & the new Smart Hub-2 have Broadcom chipsets
And Broadcom is Huawei
I wondered about that? But they are using the Broadcom word in the specs.
And from there it all goes south… on the slow boat to China…
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Well Broadcom I believe provided the transceiver / modem chipsets to Huawei in their cabs… though not 100% on that one…
That cable from the wall socket to the modem: anyone found any advantage in swapping them for something different from the bog standard cable supplied?
Appetite to experiment is important here, my reading of the original question was if there was any experience from others worth sharing of alternatives to the stock integrated products provided by the ISP.
I’ve personally found it beneficial to be able to reconfigure my ISP gateway from being a modem + router + firewall + Wi-Fi Access Point to being just a modem/bridge.
This has meant I can now use a higher performance enterprise grade router and also a separate Wi-Fi infrastructure using a wired Access point as well as extenders.
None of this was really done with music in mind, I work at home as does my wife and we also have young kids so the wireless needs to be solid to avoid falling out around the dinner table!
I’d say you can get some really good and higher performance dedicated routers and switches in to a home network which should make it more stable and reliable and have the potential upside of improving your music experience. There’s certainly a lot of discussion here around use of enterprise grade Ethernet switches for example from cisco and similar vendors and the same rules apply when considering dedicated hardware for router and Wi-Fi functions.
You could take a look at Ubiquiti and their Edgerouter products for example or a pfSense box, all of those options are around £100 and designed to be simple to setup and use but allow for advanced optimisation as the user dictates.
An ISP gateway is usually designed to support the various standards and interoperability expectations and be a general purpose device that covers the majority of use cases.
If you want to improve stability, performance and configurability then starting with something like a Draytek Vigor 130 (BT approved modem) and adding a dedicated router from Ubiquiti or similar then perhaps a higher quality switch, you end up with a network that isn’t considerably more complex to manage but should give some improvements and add some flexibility to experiment.
I’d not over think things here, spend a few hundred quid, have a play and see if it benefits you, if not move it on and stick with the integrated ISP gateway
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I changed mine simply because I needed an extra cable from wall the UPS surge filter & another from UPS to the broadband hub.
Given the cost of these things is peanuts & the cable is a twisted pair & the plugs look better made than the basic phone freebee’s, I bought two.
Did they make any difference … No or at least not that I could measure with a line sync speed test or hear with my Mk-II audio receptors
Huawei is most certainly not part of Broadcom or vice versa. In fact Huawei is effectively now blacklisted for a number of technologies including core, access and cellular. They also have restrictions on their licence with ARM which effects other parts of their business like Android mobile devices and HiSilicon SoC’s that go in to Set Top Boxes amongst other things.
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Interesting web.news https://www.extremetech.com/computing/291661-intel-qualcomm-broadcom-and-xilinx-all-move-to-cut-off-huawei
Mr M, please see my post above… Broadcom is not owned by Hauwei, but Hauwei I believe use Broadcom chipsets in its Cabs in the UK. Certainly if you look on the low layer VDSL exchanges, my Huawei cab presents its modem as Broadcom using the Broadcom Vendor ID.
@MikeD is certainly getting good value out of us lot in this thread!
I do worry it’s turning in to a much broader discussion however and perhaps isn’t helpful in answering the original question, whilst being interesting it’s probably mostly over the heads of almost everyone reading it.
I’d certainly be interested to hear what others may have used as replacement hardware. @Simon-in-Suffolk and I have had a good discussion around Wi-Fi on another thread for example.
My own experience is that minimising the work the ISP gateway does by making it do only the basic task of being a modem and doing the rest in higher spec hardware gives more flexibility and control. My motivation being a quiet life and no one moaning at me that YouTube wasn’t working in the kitchen!