Particularly good for those running a new network in a house tough to wire or for those who have snagged one of the RIO units and want to further explore ethernet over home wiring.
For minor education, HomePNA allows you to run ethernet over your existing telephone wires without disrupting or interrupting regular phone calls. It can be used on a "live" line or on the spare line that isnt currently connected by the phone co. USB and PCI adapters can be had for under $20 and PCMCIA ones for about $50. Home PNA has a 1.0 version that runs at 1Mb/s and a 2.0 version that runs at 10Mb/s. A 100Mb/s version is reported to be coming out shortly. Mixing 1.0 and 2.0 on the same wire is possible, although it drops the rate of the 2.0 devices to about 3Mb/s without improving the 1Mb/s speed of the 1.0 devices. Many tested HomePNA bridges and adapters offer excellent speed, approaching .8-.9Mb/s on the 1.0 version and 8-9+Mb/s on the 2.0 version. Plenty ample for inner home networking if you arent doing heavy video or massive file moves.
To use HomePNA, you either need to get a HomePNA compatible router like the 2Wire Homeportal that supports both ethernet and HomePNA connections to your broadband network, or you need to add a HomePNA bridge that has an ethernet connection on one side for connecting to a hub/switch/broadband and a HomePNA connector on the other side to plug into the phone lines.
You can also do a reverse implementation where you plug a device that has ethernet only (like an Audrey or other fixed function appliance) into the ethernet side of the HomePNA bridge and then into the phone line, to emerge on the other side at another bridge or router supporting HomePNA. I wired up my house this way...Running any Ethernet cabling from my second floor to my first would be a major undertaking, so I have a HomePNA bridge downstairs, connected to a hub, with a bunch of stuff plugged into that, and a Homeportal upstairs connected to the upstairs network and the broadband connection. My two Tigerdirect RIO units are homePNA'd and because I have a bridged network I was able to use a tiny bookpc appliance as my music server even though it only has an ethernet connection and cant take a HomePNA card.
The only problem with the bridges has been that the 2.0 versions have cost $120-150 and more, making them a little spendy for the home networker.
I just found a new bridge from Compex called the TH102, its selling for about $79, so you can get two for the price of one! The used 2.0 units have been ebaying for almost $100 so this is really a great deal.
Buy.com just got them in stock, I have one on order to try out, looks like a feature rich product. If you havent gotten into home networking, one of these hung off your broadband modem and plugged into the phone wire, a handful of $15-20 adapters for your pc's, and you're done!
For minor education, HomePNA allows you to run ethernet over your existing telephone wires without disrupting or interrupting regular phone calls. It can be used on a "live" line or on the spare line that isnt currently connected by the phone co. USB and PCI adapters can be had for under $20 and PCMCIA ones for about $50. Home PNA has a 1.0 version that runs at 1Mb/s and a 2.0 version that runs at 10Mb/s. A 100Mb/s version is reported to be coming out shortly. Mixing 1.0 and 2.0 on the same wire is possible, although it drops the rate of the 2.0 devices to about 3Mb/s without improving the 1Mb/s speed of the 1.0 devices. Many tested HomePNA bridges and adapters offer excellent speed, approaching .8-.9Mb/s on the 1.0 version and 8-9+Mb/s on the 2.0 version. Plenty ample for inner home networking if you arent doing heavy video or massive file moves.
To use HomePNA, you either need to get a HomePNA compatible router like the 2Wire Homeportal that supports both ethernet and HomePNA connections to your broadband network, or you need to add a HomePNA bridge that has an ethernet connection on one side for connecting to a hub/switch/broadband and a HomePNA connector on the other side to plug into the phone lines.
You can also do a reverse implementation where you plug a device that has ethernet only (like an Audrey or other fixed function appliance) into the ethernet side of the HomePNA bridge and then into the phone line, to emerge on the other side at another bridge or router supporting HomePNA. I wired up my house this way...Running any Ethernet cabling from my second floor to my first would be a major undertaking, so I have a HomePNA bridge downstairs, connected to a hub, with a bunch of stuff plugged into that, and a Homeportal upstairs connected to the upstairs network and the broadband connection. My two Tigerdirect RIO units are homePNA'd and because I have a bridged network I was able to use a tiny bookpc appliance as my music server even though it only has an ethernet connection and cant take a HomePNA card.
The only problem with the bridges has been that the 2.0 versions have cost $120-150 and more, making them a little spendy for the home networker.
I just found a new bridge from Compex called the TH102, its selling for about $79, so you can get two for the price of one! The used 2.0 units have been ebaying for almost $100 so this is really a great deal.
Buy.com just got them in stock, I have one on order to try out, looks like a feature rich product. If you havent gotten into home networking, one of these hung off your broadband modem and plugged into the phone wire, a handful of $15-20 adapters for your pc's, and you're done!
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