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Home networking is about to take on home entertainment,
and it will be an interesting place to be for both consumers and vendors alike.
For the past several years home networks have been driven by consumers
purchasing broadband Internet access and connecting their second (or third)
computer for their families. But the broadband market is saturating, and there
are only so many more PCs that families who can afford multiple computers can
purchase. The real action is going to be non-PC devices that are connected to
the home Ethernet, such as stereo equipment, cameras, phones and video servers.
Some of this gear is hitting the market now, and more is on its way. Whether
this stuff works or not remains to be seen, but clearly the concept of home
networking is expanding quickly.
We have been through once before, back in the mid-1990s
when "convergence" was all the rage. But this time we might actually
see traction on the idea. Why? Several reasons.
First off, the networking gear is almost free or fully
paid for now. I had a chance to spend some time with Sean Keohane, the CEO of
SMC Networks on a visit to my office last week. He mentioned how he is selling
gigabit Ethernet cards at less than $75 a pop, and can still make a profit at
this price point. And his costs on 10/100 Ethernet cards are in single digits,
making Ethernet everywhere a possibility. But it isn't just about NICs. Now
that many homes are wired with networks, have routers, and broadband Internet
access, the incremental cost for adding these entertainment devices (or call
them what you will) is nearly nil. You can read more of our interview with
Keohane here on VARBusiness' web site:
http://www.varbusiness.com/sections/News/breakingnews.asp?ArticleID=43251
Second, the entertainment portion of the network is being
brought to you by technology advances geared towards business users. Products
like the Spectralink wireless phones that run over the 802.11b network
infrastructure are just one example. And while they are pricey and too finicky
for the average homeowner to deal with, there are other products to come in
this brave new world of non-PC devices on the home network. How about your
stereo system? Linksys announced today their Wireless-B
Media Adapter that connects your TV or stereo to your computing network, and
allows you to play your digital music files from your PC on your stereo. SMC is
coming out with something similar this fall, and Sony has had a device for
several months. I haven't touched any of this gear yet, but hope all of them
have better user interfaces than the Voyetra product that I saw several years
ago.
Third, wireless networking is taking off, although putting
wireless in the home isn't always a slam dunk. Now McDonalds joining the
wireless access craze -- they plan on adding wireless hot spots to many of
their restaurants in several cities and have them going in San Francisco
currently. The latest crop of
802.11g products is finally here, now that that standard is in place. Linksys
told me that they are selling huge volumes of the 11g products, and other
companies have brought out their own 11g lines in the last several months. The
11g products promise greater throughput but I haven't had the time to really
test this out yet. I am somewhat shy of these predictions, given that the 11a
products that I have tested were disappointing. These products also promised
big performance gains but I only saw about a 20% improvement over the 11b
products. Keohane in our interview was bullish on the combo 11a/g products, and
we'll see some of them from SMC and others shortly.
Wireless is where the action is, but I am a bigger fan of
the powerline networking devices and hope these will get some play from the
vendors because they just work. In several homes that I have tried to connect
wireless access points and failed, the powerline devices just shine. These
products work over the AC power lines of your home and provided that you don't
plug them into a surge protector (which happened at one friend's house), they
work flawlessly and without a great deal of configuration and messing around
with various parameters. I like them because they work in every house that I've
tried them, and they reduce my neighborhood support time significantly. This
isn't the case with wireless networks: most homes have dead spots that the
wireless signals don't reach, and typically these are the precise places that a
user wants to drag their laptop and work from. The nice thing about powerline
products is as long as you have AC power outlet nearby, you can communicate.
Unfortunately, networking manufacturers haven't really
gotten excited about powerline. It could be a combination of because they got
burned with the phoneline products (which are terrible and I don't recommend)
or because they have too little bandwidth or because there aren't too many
chipset suppliers for the gear. I hope this changes and we have as active a
development community for powerline as we do for wireless in the near future.
In any event, wireless is getting a big push from Intel,
who is spending tons of dough to convince people to buy their Centrino laptops
that have 11b wireless networks built-in. Intel wasted a lot of time and money
on another wireless standard called HomeRF that went nowhere, so hopefully this
will pay off for both WiFi and Intel. But again, this isn't just about NICs:
what gets me out of bed in the morning and into my lab is the promise of new
and interesting ways that wireless networks can be integrated into other kinds
of products: wireless cameras, wireless connections to my stereo gear, and so
forth.
I'll give you another example of how adding wireless can
be a big boon (the Linksys product mentioned above is one). SMC is working on a
new product that is an all-in-one cable modem/router/wireless access point that
can eliminate up to three different boxes. It is called the 8013WG, and look
for it in the fall. Many home networks get started when the family gets
involved in broadband access. This is one way to simplify their lives and also
expand their networks easily. We'll see how easily once SMC sends me the box
and I try it out for myself.
This leads me to my last point: many cable companies are
finally getting with the networking program. Until relatively recently, many
cable operators didn't want their customers to install home networks: they were
afraid that networks will clog their pipes, or consume more IP addresses, or
increase their support problems. The smarter ones are figuring out that
networks can sell more cable modems and raise their monthly nut that they
collect from their customer. The trouble is the cable companies do a miserable
job of supporting their networks and have used the promise of Internet access
as a means to finance a network upgrade, a network that will mostly be used to
sell more video channels rather than more data bandwidth. But perhaps they are
finally getting things right.
Re-reading this column, there is still a lot of work
before we can have a consolidated Jetsons-like home where the stereo downloads
the music it thinks we like to hear and turns the volume down when the wireless
phone rings. But the products and approaches I mentioned are all promising
signs that home networks are going Hollywood and the unified field theory is a
bit closer to reality.
Shameless plug
As some of you might know, I have been interested in this
topic for quite some time, having written my second book (with the catchy
title, "Home Networking Survival Guide") which came out in September
2001. Things have changed since then, but I modestly think my book is the best
one on the market still for helping people get their networks going. And if you
act now, you can still pick up a copy on Amazon.com.
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0072193115/davidstromswebin
Entire contents copyright 2003 by David Strom,
Inc.
David Strom, dstrom@cmp.com, +1 (516) 562-7151
Port Washington NY 11050
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