Cable Industry Considerations in Choosing Wireless Home Networking Technology

Home networking evolved over the last few years into an affordable technology that can be applied to cable customers. Many home networking alternatives were proposed over the last few years. Wireless home networking emerged as the most promising solution in terms of consumer and operator benefits. We will compare the wireless home networking variants to other alternative home networking technologies and discuss the wireless home networking options. We will focus especially on IEEE 802.11 and its various extensions, and discuss what features are important for addressing the Cable industry needs and their importance to enable new revenue opportunities. Home Networking Overview Home networking has rapidly emerged in the last three years and is considered today as an important element for home connectivity. Many home networking alternatives exist to date with each alternative further divided into flavors, which makes it very confusing for the consumer and operator. The main home networking alternatives are: • Wireless home networking: Utilizing RF technology to create a wireless local area network. This category includes IEEE 802.11[1], HomeRF[2], and HiperLAN2. • Home phone line networking: Using phone lines to create a home network. This category includes HPNA1.0[3] and HPNA2.0. • Power line home networking: Utilizing AC power line network as the home network media. This category includes HomePlug[4] and X-10 technologies. • Ethernet: This good and mature technology can be used for networking the home, however unlike the previous technologies, requires addition of CAT5 wires across the home.