I'll just say up front that this will be a fairly biased opinion since I recently co-founded a home networking company. [Shameless plug: www.coaxsys.com]
That said, there are a number of wired solutions. Cat5e is nice because it's cheap and fast, but the problem is the installation can cost a few hundred dollars a room. (Figure $70/hr for one of those slow moving electricians). And even then, wives aren't happy when you punch holes in the walls or run cables around the house. There are also other wired solutions, like HPNA or HomePlug. Unfortunately, they don't currently have the speed for really moving video around, but if they manage to survive I'm sure they will sooner or later. In the end, it doesn't really matter because I've heard real horror stories about HomePlug (they've definitely had a poor track record for reliability). And let's face it... who really needs high speed access where their phone jacks are? (At least not until video phones become vogue).
As far as wireless goes, it's definitely got a lot of hype behind it but it's got one unsolvable flaw - reliability. As InStat analyst Mike Wolf points out, wired is and always will be more reliable than wireless. Security concerns will come and go, and eventually wireless will have more bandwidth (although, that doesn't mean you should be a sucker and think that wireless really does offer 50+Mb/s currently... you can expect to see about 20Mb/s in real life), but ultimately wireless will always be subject to interference, especially while it's in open spectrums that are subject to noise from other devices (including other wireless networks). For entertainment networks, consumers will find such interference unacceptable... people are willing to accept new technology that crashes or is a little flakey (MS for example), but they will be unwilling to replace 99% dependable technology (like telephone or cable service) with something that is significantly less reliable.
That doesn't mean that wireless isn't going to succeed. It's great for data communications and mobility, just not for media.
This is where our company (Coaxsys) intends to come into play. We offer 100Mb/s networking over home coax without interfering with cable television, DOCSIS cable modems, satellite television, cable telephony, etc. Our product, Coaxsys PureSpeed, is basically an Ethernet to Coax bridge that allows different consumer electronics that already have Ethernet incorporated to communicate with each other over coax. This could be your PS2 and your cable modem, or it could be your two ReplayTVs. We'll be announcing product at E3 next week and rolling out product for $350 somewhere around mid-year.
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I'll just say up front that this will be a fairly biased opinion since I recently co-founded a home networking company. [Shameless plug: www.coaxsys.com]
:)
That said, there are a number of wired solutions. Cat5e is nice because it's cheap and fast, but the problem is the installation can cost a few hundred dollars a room. (Figure $70/hr for one of those slow moving electricians). And even then, wives aren't happy when you punch holes in the walls or run cables around the house.
There are also other wired solutions, like HPNA or HomePlug. Unfortunately, they don't currently have the speed for really moving video around, but if they manage to survive I'm sure they will sooner or later. In the end, it doesn't really matter because I've heard real horror stories about HomePlug (they've definitely had a poor track record for reliability). And let's face it... who really needs high speed access where their phone jacks are? (At least not until video phones become vogue).
As far as wireless goes, it's definitely got a lot of hype behind it but it's got one unsolvable flaw - reliability. As InStat analyst Mike Wolf points out, wired is and always will be more reliable than wireless. Security concerns will come and go, and eventually wireless will have more bandwidth (although, that doesn't mean you should be a sucker and think that wireless really does offer 50+Mb/s currently... you can expect to see about 20Mb/s in real life), but ultimately wireless will always be subject to interference, especially while it's in open spectrums that are subject to noise from other devices (including other wireless networks). For entertainment networks, consumers will find such interference unacceptable... people are willing to accept new technology that crashes or is a little flakey (MS for example), but they will be unwilling to replace 99% dependable technology (like telephone or cable service) with something that is significantly less reliable.
That doesn't mean that wireless isn't going to succeed. It's great for data communications and mobility, just not for media.
This is where our company (Coaxsys) intends to come into play. We offer 100Mb/s networking over home coax without interfering with cable television, DOCSIS cable modems, satellite television, cable telephony, etc. Our product, Coaxsys PureSpeed, is basically an Ethernet to Coax bridge that allows different consumer electronics that already have Ethernet incorporated to communicate with each other over coax. This could be your PS2 and your cable modem, or it could be your two ReplayTVs. We'll be announcing product at E3 next week and rolling out product for $350 somewhere around mid-year.
Now accepting beta testers.
Adam Powers, CTO, Coaxsys