HomePlug or Wireless?
 

I'm trying to figure out how to set up my new house's network. On the main level, I will have my home office with DSL access point. I need two DirecTv access points and one TiVo access point on the main level. I need a DirecTv and computer access in the finished basement. Maybe add a slingbox at a later date. I would love to work on the back deck overlooking the horses, but it is not a deal breaker.

In reading other threads, it appears that security issues are easily overcome, and I live rural now, so the property density is about 4 houses in 10 acres.

I'm looking at cost and performance. I run basic internet applications...no heavy online gaming or resource hogs like that.

Anybody have experience with both systems?

we have both wire and wireless. the wire is clustered on 2 levels in a corner of the house(5 computers and 4 printers), and we have a wireless outlet for wife to run laptop in kitchen.

she did some encoding to keep the neighbors out of out network. she also encoded 2 neighbors, as she could see their computers on line..."hey, there's georges laptop".

the hard wire is great. have 8mbps from comcast. office has 1.5mbps from verison dsl. the difference is noticable.

these guys have cables and prices.

http://www.computergate.com/

my wife use to buy the color 3' cables to give to the techs and to customers as presents.

802.11g wireless routers are cheap, so you should try that first to see if it meets your needs.

We'll I was just about to shamelessly plug the 3 part article on my blog (below) about setting up a home network, both wired and wireless....but my hosting company appears to be having issues.

Edited to add:
Links are back up.... home network guide, Part 1 Part 2 and Part 3

I favor a mixture of the two media. But if budget, time and a lack of willingness to put holes in your walls are issues then go with Redburgundy's suggestion. Try wireless first.
I'm a little unclear how directv plays into the mix, other than that if you are running coax you might as well pull cat 5 too. However, if you need wired network access, say for regular (non-directv, or hacked dtv tivos) then wireless bridges (devices that receive the wireless signal and then give you a jack to 'hard wire' into) can get expensive quickly.

Another thing to consider is what kind of traffic you'll have. If you plan to move videos around then hard wired is the way to go. Even if you dont have gigabite ethernet, the 100mbs speed that Ethernet provides blows wireless out of the water. 802.11g touts 54mbs, but its fairly rare to get that kind of speed and any sustained rate.

In terms of security, you are absolutely right, wireless can be made quite secure. However, that takes a little effort to set it up correctly. I fall into the paranoid category around here, but I feel strong about this. The only kind of security that is effective for wireless is WPA/WPA2 with a very long, random passphrase. I recommend the full 64 bit sting that WPA supports. Check out www.grc.com/pass for a site that will generate strings. Then copy the string to a $20 128mb USB thumb drive. When you need to setup new devices on the wireless network, plug in the drive and copy and paste. To be clear ssid hiding and mac filtering are not security but means to obfuscate your network. WEP is older security and can be compromised by a 13 year old and a $100 laptop off ebay.

I have both types of networks right now, and have had much better luck with HomePlug. Right now I have the latest from Netgear (Powerline HD) and it works great, although somewhat expensive. My wireless network is just not that stable - I use Belkin Pre-N, and that has been the best for me so far but still not as good as HomePlug.

I have both kinds... I wired everything myself... use the wireless for notebooks only. everything else goes through copper.

Thanks for all the advice! ^

As I understand it, you plug a HomePlug unit into a socket, and plug an ethernet cable into it. (Or is it USB?)

I'm not looking to install any wire.

To clarify - The DirecTv and TiVo units need a phone connection or network connection to talk to their servers. I was looking at a network connection because my Tivo and phone lines are on opposite sides of the room.

Yes, that's correct, and yes for Ethernet. There may be USB ones too, I haven't seen any.
HomePlug stuff should work fine -- as long as the electrical wiring in your house is in good shape. You said it is your "new" house, but is it new to you, or is it recently-built? At any rate, you should hold on the receipt and boxes until you test it!

New to me. It was built in 1994.

For several reasons, I just now had the wherewithall to install the HomePlug system. I plugged the unit into the wall in my office, ran an ethernet cable to my router, plugged in a similar device in the basement, ran a cable to the other computer and everything works. No drivers, no set-up, zilch. I haven't run a speed test, but it seems to be pretty fast. I'll give it a ^ , and check the long term performance. I paid $99 for two units.

I'm going to bump this one with a question...
What's the secuiry on powerline devices? What keeps someone in your neighborhood from plugging into their outlet and getting a connection through you? I'm sure there are power limits, but that's never stopped a hacker...
Anyone know how these work?
I thought I'd start here before I did any hardcore research...more curious than anything...I've pulled enough network drops to keep me busy for a long time.

I seripusly doubt there is any security associated with it. The only thing is that these units have limited range. Ie. they only go so far on the cable.

In past, some of the Home Automation Systems modulated and transported data via power lines, but it never reached very far... just stay confined to one house or a part of it.

encryption
 

There IS actually encryption on the powerline. I am actually, only using a very limited protocol, to reduce headroom and to only segregate activity since I have a number of homeplug devices in the house. I can segregate the HD versions, from the non-hd versions with Security and passwords. I’m not TOO concerned with my neighbor pickup up the signal, but not too sure how far reaching the connectivity goes.

Yes, there is security, at least on the Netgear units I use. I remember setting it up as an option, though I don't remember if it is WEP or WPA or something else.

By the way, I live in two neighboring condo units, and the signals do not travel from one unit to the other, unfortunately in this case.

I was never a fan of those homeplugs, I tired it out in a few different houses, and always had issues. Maybe the new ones are better, but I prefer Wifi over those plugs any day. But if it works for you, then great! Just try it out. Im a way, just for mainly updating the schedules and other feature, Wifi might be overkill. Slingbox should be fine, as your internet line is never gunna get mear 100mbits/sec to actually stream.

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.