Wireless-Nada

[jeff_duntemann]

I've been holding back on revising my 2004 book Jeff Duntemann's Wi-Fi Guide for almost two years now, hoping for finalization of the IEEE 802.11n spec. It seems like we've had "Draft-N" products piled up in Best Buy since the glaciers retreated, and yet the specification seems no closer to

Comments

[baron_waste]

I actually understand what you're saying. That's a big deal for Mr Anachronism, here.

[jeff_duntemann]

I had CAT5E put in the walls of my new house too, but the nice thing about Powerline is that once the bricks have been configured, they retain the config parameters (including security keys) in Flash and can be moved around without additional fooling-with. Basically, I have one at the router, and the other one can be plugged into any outlet in the house and just work--and when you need to move, you just yank it and plug it in somewhere else. You still have a wire to the brick, but this has proven to be less of an annoyance for me than I thought it would.

[tonyinknoxville]

For a year my 802.11g worked great for my desktop. Until one day last February I could not make or keep a connection. No problem for the laptop but the desktop just refused to work.

In desperation I went to BestBuy and purchased Netgear bricks and have had very little problem since.

Now the funny thing is the printer, which was in the same room as my desktop, is on a wireless printer server. It has not had any issues. I was thinking my desktop wireless card had gone south but I was not willing to purchase another WiFi card so soon. And I like the powerline adapter well enough if I could just get more speed.

Oh well.

Take care,

[etfb]

I live in Canberra, where CSIRO (usually pronounced /SIGH-roe/) has most of its administrative offices. Want me to pop in and slap 'em around for you? I'll do it if you let me also slap the inventors of Panoptic, the godawful web search engine they invented that makes most AusGov websites unusable.

Radiation issues?

[n8ux]

Are there any issues with signal egress using the power line bricks? I'm not that active in amateur radio anymore, but that was the first thing that popped into my head. RF on an unshielded line.

I know the ARRL is fighting a somewhat losing battle with the FCC and utility companies over broadband over powerline technology. RF radiation there is a big problem, not just for HF operators, but all over the spectrum....Rich

Re: Radiation issues?

[jeff_duntemann]

My (brief) tests failed to hear any interference on HF while the bricks were in place and working. Supposedly, they only put RF on the line when packets are being passed, but my Icom 736 heard nothing, so I'm not sure if I wasn't looking in the right place on the spectrum, or if it really isn't an issue. Nor did I hear anything on 6M or 2M. So I don't know.