Systems and methods for evaluating a customer premise equipment (CPE) device. A network element management system may send an alteration request to a configurable coaxial tap. The alteration request may cause the configurable coaxial tap to alter the characteristics of the configurable coaxial tap and/or to manipulate the radio frequency (RF) characteristics of a CPE device coupled to the configurable coaxial tap. The network element management system may receiving impaired operation reports from a cable modem termination system (CMTS), and send an un-alteration request to the configurable coaxial tap. The un-alteration request may cause the configurable coaxial tap to undo the alterations to the characteristics of the configurable coaxial tap or to undo the manipulated RF characteristics of the CPE. The network element management system may receive and use information the CMTS to determine modem-tap-port correlations and the physical location of the CPE.