Information Addicts

Image courtesy of cell105

Picture this, you are working on an online document on your laptop, connected via your WiFi router, but get disconnected, and 2 hours of work is lost.
Or you are playing a game on the internet and are just about to get the highest score and you lose connection. Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah.
Frustrating isn’t it? I don’t know what is worse waiting for it to reconnect or constantly getting disconnected.

We receive many calls at work from users who constantly get disconnected from the internet and desperately need to get back on, time is money.
WiFi can be a right pain in the ars. at times.
Thick walls, being to far away from the router and odd shaped rooms are some of the causes of lost connection. If only there was a better solution.

Well now there is, in the form of Powerline Adaptors.

What are Powerline Adaptors?
Powerline adaptors are basically plugin adaptors that go into your household wall sockets to create an instant network.

How do they work?
Once the Powerline adaptors are plugged in, flick the switch and they will utilise the existing electrical wiring of your house. They have a very low power consumption which means they cost very little to run. Most Powerline adaptors are plug n play, meaning once you have plugged them into your wall socket, all you then need to do is connect them to your PC, Laptop or modem via an Ethernet cable and that’s it. Not only are they less hassle than wireless networks, but they can be faster, (theoretically speeds up to 200Mbps but its more like 14-80Mpbs), more secure, (each wall mounted plug uses upto 128 bit data encryption which means that it is almost impossible to hack), and much more reliable.
Take a look at the below diagram to get a better idea of how they can work.

Image taken from the Aztec website

As you can see from the above picture this network also uses a wireless plug adaptor, which can give you more flexibility to your network, if needed.

If you don’t want the hassle, or you’re struggling with a Wifi network, then Powerline networking might be the choice for you.

Powerlines do have have a downside, and that is they work better in some houses than others, as it all depends on the electrical wiring. That is why I wrote earlier that you will get speeds of between 14-80Mpbs.

Why are Powerline adaptor networks not that well know? Simple, lack of devices on the market, however I have scoured the internet for the better ones out there, take a look.

The best Powerline adaptors on the market at the moment are the Solwise HomePlug AV 200Mpbs, unfortunately I cannot find anywhere in the US where you can purchase them. Do you know where you can buy these?

Take a look at this excellent article from Register Hardware.

The next best are the Actiontec MegaPlug 85 Mbps Ethernet Adapter Twin-Pack and the Netgear HDXB101 Powerline HD Ethernet Kit.
Do you use them or have you tried them? If so let me know what you think.

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This entry was posted on Monday, February 18th, 2008 at 8:09 am and is filed under Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.