recent and current
 

Well, I can only speak for recent, 2-3 years old, and current gen products.

The previous gen, was indeed limited to 11-14mbs, but I only ever got a constant throughput of 5-7mbs max. That was fine, as you say, internet is 2mbs max to the house, and the slingbox WAS only transmitting at 2.5kps

The current GEN, the "hd" version, quote 800-200mbs throughput, but I have only ever gotten a consistent 35-40mbs throughput. Which, as experienced is LESS THAN quote 802.11G tech, but my best throughput on G was only 22mbs.

Again, LESS than the internet speed, but I do a lot of large file transfers back to a central server, and NAS, so speed is a plus.

AND, the new PRO slingbox, will do about 8mbs throughput, slinging the HD signal over the LAN, which looks VERY nice indeed. So, the new GEN is an improvement for constant use, but only for this application.

I HAVE had problems with all the devices, in ONE plug in the house, when the overhead LIGHT is on. It doesn't make a lot of sense, but when I switch that overhead light on, BOOM, all throughput goes to the crapper. Switch light off, and we're back on the autobahn.!

My Netgear HDX101 powerline units report that they are giving me 85Mbps right now, though they are in adjoining rooms. They were so much easier to configure than any wireless network I've ever had. On the other hand, I still get some choppiness streaming big video files (over 1.5gb in size), whereas the same files stream fine over my Belkin Pre-N network.

well
 

While you might be connected, at least reported by the netgear software, at 85mbps, I can virtually assure you the throughput is not even half that.

One has to use something like ixchariot, to actually test the sustained or even burst throughput. I'm using the latest netgears, which say they are connected at 200MBs, but I get the 40+ posted above.

Is that nearly 10x, what the previous generation yielded, yep as sure as butterscotch topping on ice cream is goooodd!

As for the devices, I believe they are ALL created by ONE company in Asia (of course) and all branded differantly, which some slight differances in functionality and software, but for the most part the SW is the same for all devices, dlink, belkin, netgear, slinglink, all of which I have.

As for throughput, you might do best setting up the QOS, to prioritize any video traffic, which can be setup at the device level, via the software. As well, lights and other electrical traffic, devices on the network will either slow performance or make the sustained throughput, lumpy!

I could imagine that a good 802.11g, or N network, could have better video streaming capability. I know the latest HD netgears, do work better for my HD PRO slingbox, but since that streams, and bufffers, at 8mbs, I probably don't see a differance, not choppy, great quality, since the buffer catches the lumps in the streams.