Hi iam sorry ntl will ony change a stb if it is faulty they will not changea stb for the sake of it .I cant answer the question about the upgrade as i work with sacm .I would think they might give you a stand alone modem rather than a other box thats my opinion.Back to samsung boxes if you have a pace box and theer is a fault on it there is a 50 50 chance you might get another pace.We have no say what boxes are deliverd to us .On my aera we have just got samsungs but we have nt seen them for 2 weeksAsk the tech if he has any BUT please dont whine when the tech says he has none.For most techs this is a pet hate when customers do this.I would happliy change boxes over when they are fault for a samsung