> Enter '1', '2', or 'p' within 2 seconds or take default...
Wait, tens or hundreds of millions of cable modem startups are delayed by 2s on each start just in case somebody has soldered up a serial interface and wants to load a different image?
This is pretty much a universal feature of any device with a bootloader and an OS. If it weren't there, you wouldn't be able to diagnose anything. 2 seconds is reasonable.
If you want to talk about human productivity being pointlessly wasted while waiting for things to load, let's start with modern web apps.
You could make that require a jumper somewhere, but 2 seconds added to the boot time, when a working modem probably doesn't boot more than once a month is simply not a lot of time.
I think the 3 cents saved on a jumper block per unit is fine, but since we’re talking about a UART requiring soldering you’re access, holding two lines together to access debug mode seems fine.
You should consider cycling more often if your ISP purges IP assignment records and tries to assign new IPs upon reconnect.
Mine keeps records for 30 days after lease expiry (usually your session end date)