Ethernet over Powerlines

T

tingies

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Mar 25, 2009
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I'm looking into networking my house using power lines. I'm gonna use the network to connect a couple of PC's for browsing and 2 gaming consoles. Mostly though, I plan to use it for HD video streaming. I'm talking about 5GB to 12GB .mkv video files. There's only gonna be 1 stream going at any given time.

I've been looking at the Linksys adapter and it claims to reach speeds up to 200Mbps. I really don't know how well it performs nor know anyone that has used it.

Will the power lines provide enough bandwidth to stream without having any problems?
 
I've read the Linksys PLK300 reviews on newegg and a lot of people seem to like it. Some people had trouble with it but the vast majority gave it thumbs up. I think I might bite the bullet and go for it, just not quite yet. I don't wanna go and spend all that money and find out that it doesn't cover my needs. Need to look into it more
 
i know someone with one of these kits. i dont know anything about his setup other than it spans 3 stories, but he constantly gets DC'ed in games and vent if someone's using the microwave or blow dryer that are on different floors.
 
I've seen these before and last time I talked to people who used them, they're a joke. They may have improved but last I heard you get roughtly 1-5mbps and there is a LOT of interference. (keep in mind I personally have never used these, I've always gone standard ethernet or WiFi b/g/n)

Better off to go wired with gigibit, if you need high-speed, or to try and get 802.11n setup to work. I had an "all trendnet 802.11n" setup and I managed some decent LAN speeds, but it's going to be expensive and I dont know if you can hit 200mbps... Best bet is a gigabit Ethernet LAN.
 
I had one of the first generation Linksys models. During my relocation, I currently live in an old...old...old old rennovated several times old farmhouse that is 3 stories high with 2x additions over the years. So one can easily figure out that the electrical system is a bunch of duct tape, paperclips, and bondo. Crappy electrical system.

Wireless of course sucked for online gaming that required higher bandwidth and fast rates..such as some of the Battlefield series of games. Get into some high actual screens with many players, dive bombing runs..and the wireless always chocked.

So snagged a pair of the first generation Linksys ethernet over powerline, like a plk200 or something. My online gaming became smoooooth as buttah..just as solid as if I can CAT6 across all 3 stories of the house. Pretty good stability, maybe once a week or 10 days or so I'd have to unplug and plug back in so they could pair up again.

When I added a 3rd to the top floor, started getting some unreliability between 3rd floor and first floor..sometimes unplug/plug back in every couple of days, but that was early firmware version which I had read had issues with using more than a pair on the same network. Again, this was a few years ago when they first came out.

Speedwise...definitely faster than wireless G, seemed almost as fast a 100 meg.

I have not used it since, because I ran my cables coax to the 3rd floor since my office is up here, but I've installed a few at clients and have no issues.

There's no guarantee, since..like wireless, there is no 100% control of the physical environment. But as my setup showed, they even did better than wireless when used in my really poorly run old electrical system. If running copper yourself is not an option...it's certainly worth less than a hundred bucks to try this IMO.
 
I'll chime in here and say that at my father's big old victorian house, full of thick metal plumbing and ollllllddd electrical wiring, I had finally gotten fed up with driving out every other week to investigate why his desktop's wireless N was being so flakey (not sure whether to chalk it up to interference in the old house or a crappy USB adapter), so I slapped in 2 Ethernet over Powerline adapters and he's been happy since; it's been as solid as any ethernet network.

There really was no way to run ethernet down to his PC without drilling through hardwood flooring and making a real mess, and since my younger brother already had the router set up at the other end of the house where he did all his gaming, it was just too much trouble to try to run ethernet cabling down to dad's PC.

I put it in a few years ago, and I think it's only an 11 mbps connection, but since my dad only uses the net (which is about 11 mbps out there, give or take a megabit), it works perfectly.

Security and interference handling is surprisingly good on these units when they're set up properly. They use Collision Avoidance just like wireless to deal with interference, exchange keys and handle encryption through the power line, and definitely is more secure than wireless.

In all honesty, I'd love to see it replace UTP / STP cable some day... okay maybe it won't hit gigabit speeds any time soon, but it works just fine for the majority of sprawling home networks, and is just such a better solution than wireless when cable can't be run.
 
I can say that I have IP TV from my phone company and they use ethernet over power to get to a room that just can't easily be connected. They use Pluglink AV units and they work very well.
 
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