July 27, 1998
Exciting new developments in home networking products
By Bob O'Donnell
Computer networks and the products that go into building them are such well-established
entities that it's usually pretty hard to get very excited about new developments. But
that's all changing with the growth of specialized home networking products, many of which
use intriguing new technologies to bring the power of networking into home environments.
Individual companies and industry consortiums are working on technologies that ease the
process of wiring a network by either using the home's existing wiring (a capability
touted as "no new wires") or by being completely wireless. The "no new
wires" technologies are being built around one of two alternatives -- either the
home's electrical wiring or its existing phone lines. The Home Phoneline Networking
Alliance, (HomePNA) is working on a standard based
around Tut Systems' HomeRun technology,
which, in its original incarnations, will offer the equivalent of a 1Mbps Ethernet network
using any phone jack in the house. Products based on this technology are due in the fall.
One of the first products to market is Intelogis' Passport network, which
uses your home's electrical wiring to create a simple network that runs at about 350Kbps
(later versions are expected to offer higher throughput). I recently installed the $249
Passport package (which includes external network adapters for two computers and one
printer, as well as the necessary software) in my home, and I have to say, I'm a believer.
Setting up the hardware was as easy as plugging the Passport adapters directly into
wall outlets and then to each of the PC's and printer's parallel ports. One minor beef is
that you can't use any power strips with these devices and they're a bit too plump to fit
behind a piece of furniture leaning up against one of your wall outlets. To help with the
first point, Intelogis includes two simple power strips for plugging in devices you need
to unplug to get the Passport adapters plugged straight into the wall.
The software installation process is still glitchy, and I had a few minor difficulties
getting the system initially set up, though I was able to resolve them on my own. The
product installs its own LPX protocols, which is apparently based on SPX, but also works
with TCP/IP, and the installation takes care of making the proper protocol bindings along
with all that other messy networking stuff that consumers don't want to deal with.
Unfortunately, setting up the bundled WinProxy software -- which lets multiple PCs on the
network share a single Internet account -- isn't nearly as automated and requires a fair
bit of knowledge about TCP/IP to get it working properly.
Once I got everything going, I had a nice little home network that let me share files,
the printer, and an Internet account. I can even play network games. I have to admit that
it was a real trip the first time I printed something from the computer in my son's room
to the printer that sits down in my home office. Knowing that the signals were simply
passing over the 50-year-old electrical wiring in my house, I couldn't help but be
impressed. I had a similar rush the first time I got that previously unconnected machine
to share the ISDN line I have installed in my home office to connect to the Internet. This
is neat technology (and one that's actually going to help my marriage -- like when my wife
wants to surf the Net at the same time I do).
One interesting issue regarding Passport, as well as several other proposed home
networking technologies, is security. Because of the way these devices work, you could
open up the contents of your home PC's hard drive to your neighbors. With the Passport,
for example, it creates a network that extends all the way to the closest transformer,
which is apparently shared by several homes (or multiple apartments in those buildings).
Intelogis --whose founders came from Novell -- takes care of these issues by allowing you
to build a secure network that can only be seen by the computers you include in your
network.
As much as I like the Passport product, I still think it's a bit pricey -- particularly
when you consider that adding extra PCs costs $100 each and extra printers are $50 more.
But, like most technology-oriented devices, I'm sure they'll come down over time. If
you're ready to network your home computers, I suggest you give it a try. It may even
remind you of how fun computers and networks can be.
©
Copyright 1998, by InfoWorld Publishing Corp., a
subsidiary of IDG Communications, Inc. Reprinted from InfoWorld,
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