Ethernet over Power???

[Diablo2K]

I have not heard of Ethernet Over Power until today. I had heard of power over ethernet but not this. I live in a single floor house that is kind of L shaped floor plan and it is a long way from one end to the other. The wireless router and cable modem is all the way on one end of the house. I had the Spectrum Pods to help get internet connection to the other end of the house and it was not reliable. The pods kept losing connection and they were returned. Right now I have a single wifi extender that helps in the kitchen and living room but not in the "Cave" (roommates hangout/office). I was thinking of getting a Mesh system but it would have to be daisy chained to get good signal to the cave and there's no way I could aford get it wired for Backhaul.
Would something like TP-Link AV2000 Powerline Adapter work to get internet to the other end of the house? Also could I plug it into a wireless extender to have Wifi or would I need another wifi router? Can I add a 3rd "satellite" unit in the middle to get even better coverage in the house. One of the Extenders I have now is the TP-Link RE220 the other is a TP-Link RE315. I only have 300meg internet service so I don't need 1gig wifi throughout the house, or do I?
One last question would there be a way to get seamless transfers from one connection to the other like they have in Mesh systems? Wait, what if I just set the connection in the middle of the house, use a router for wireless connection. When I am in the Cave on my cell phone I can get a week signal to my wireless router and get internet. If i had the router in the middle of the house the signal in the cave should be strong enough reliable internet connection.
Sorry for the brain dump.
Your thoughts please.

 

[HeavensCloud]

I use them in my 114 year old house and have set them up at my mom's to reach their new building out back. They are pretty much set it and forget it. You can use network extenders or routers in AP mode or whatever else at the other end. Just think of it as an easier way to make a run of ethernet without drilling into floors and walls. At my mom's the run from the outlet inside to the building out back is ~100 feet and it works well. I think most POE systems can utilize pretty much as many adapters as you want to plug in, makes it easy to add ethernet ports anywhere you want in the house. I even have some plugged into surge protectors with no noticeable loss of bandwidth.

 

[toast0]

Powerline adapters can work, but don't always; be sure you buy from somewhere you can easily return if it doesn't work out for you after some trying. Do you have any existing communications wiring? A lot of people have success with MoCA on coax; and telephone wire can often be repurposed, depending on how old the wiring is, and what terrible things have been done in the meantime.

 

[Diablo2K]

Powerline adapters can work, but don't always; be sure you buy from somewhere you can easily return if it doesn't work out for you after some trying. Do you have any existing communications wiring? A lot of people have success with MoCA on coax; and telephone wire can often be repurposed, depending on how old the wiring is, and what terrible things have been done in the meantime.

Thank you for your input.

When I moved in about a year and a half ago the house never had cable and I have not seen any phone jacks now that I think about it. It did have satellite TV at one point but from the looks of the outside cables it looks like someone tried to pull all the cable out from under the house.
I would get something from Amazon, I use to be able to take things to Kohls to return them. I had done that a couple times. But now it looks like I would have to take them to the UPS store in the next town. They would package it and send it back to Amazon. I am only like 10-15 miles from a major Amazon warehouse, I get stuff really quickly here.

 

[SamirD]

Best Buy or office supply chains carry the powerline adapters. The reason you want to get them local is you'll know in about 5 minutes if they're going to do the trick or not, so kinda stupid to wait even a day to get them or to return them.

For your scenario, think of how you would design the network if you had wired connections anywhere you want them. Now, get those powerlines and see if they work. If they do, that's your 'wired connections anywhere you want them'. You can then get one of those stupid mesh systems and use your 'wired' backhaul for them, but imo it's wasting hundreds of dollars when you can just fine tune the signals on the APs you currently have and get nearly the same effect.

 

[sram]

https://www.tp-link.com/uk/home-networking/powerline/tl-wpa8631p-kit/

That works very well with me, although it is hard to find now. But you need to make sure it works with your home wiring. I think the two power outlets you want to connect using power-line adapters need to be on the same circuit breaker, otherwise it won't work.

If not, use devolo. They have good products and you can extend as much as you want. They even have a device that can turn every power socket you have into a potential network jack:

https://www.devolo.global/products

 

[Diablo2K]

Best Buy or office supply chains carry the powerline adapters. The reason you want to get them local is you'll know in about 5 minutes if they're going to do the trick or not, so kinda stupid to wait even a day to get them or to return them.

For your scenario, think of how you would design the network if you had wired connections anywhere you want them. Now, get those powerlines and see if they work. If they do, that's your 'wired connections anywhere you want them'. You can then get one of those stupid mesh systems and use your 'wired' backhaul for them, but imo it's wasting hundreds of dollars when you can just fine tune the signals on the APs you currently have and get nearly the same effect.

https://www.tp-link.com/uk/home-networking/powerline/tl-wpa8631p-kit/

That works very well with me, although it is hard to find now. But you need to make sure it works with your home wiring. I think the two power outlets you want to connect using power-line adapters need to be on the same circuit breaker, otherwise it won't work.

If not, use devolo. They have good products and you can extend as much as you want. They even have a device that can turn every power socket you have into a potential network jack:

https://www.devolo.global/products

Yeah, I found TP-Link Powerline Wi-Fi Extender (TL-WPA7617KIT) last night looking on Amazon. I don't know what the differance is between the TP-Link Powerline WiFi Extender(TL-WPA8631P KIT) you linked and the other one other then the $20 price difference. I like with these they have Wifi built in and I can get a TP-Link router and have there OneMesh setup throughout the house. I will look to see if there available at Best Buy like the other poster says for easy return.

[LOL] I just seen the more expensive one has 3 ethernet ports where the cheaper one has 1 and a little higher speed over power but the same speed wireless.

 

[SamirD]

https://www.tp-link.com/uk/home-networking/powerline/tl-wpa8631p-kit/

That works very well with me, although it is hard to find now. But you need to make sure it works with your home wiring. I think the two power outlets you want to connect using power-line adapters need to be on the same circuit breaker, otherwise it won't work.

If not, use devolo. They have good products and you can extend as much as you want. They even have a device that can turn every power socket you have into a potential network jack:

https://www.devolo.global/products

Wow, devolo has some neat stuff that isn't available in the US markets. Thank you for sharing!

 

[SamirD]

Yeah, I found TP-Link Powerline Wi-Fi Extender (TL-WPA7617KIT) last night looking on Amazon. I don't know what the differance is between the TP-Link Powerline WiFi Extender(TL-WPA8631P KIT) you linked and the other one other then the $20 price difference. I like with these they have Wifi built in and I can get a TP-Link router and have there OneMesh setup throughout the house. I will look to see if there available at Best Buy like the other poster says for easy return.

[LOL] I just seen the more expensive one has 3 ethernet ports where the cheaper one has 1 and a little higher speed over power but the same speed wireless.

I have powerlines with 500, 1200, 1500, and 2000 speeds. Each generation of speed increase basically doubles the previous generation's speed over the same wiring. My Netgear av500 nanos can do 40Mb at my parent's house. Same locations with the 2000s will hit almost 200Mbs in each direction. So I wouldn't get anything powerlines less than the 2000 standard. These are just like wifi 'theoretical' speeds so you won't get anything close to them. However, I know the 2000 ones will do full duplex 100Mbs (200Mbs) so you should barely notice any Internet slow down.

As far as the wifi piece, just rearrange your existing APs using them not as repeaters, but APs plugged into the powerlines. Then each AP will be able to do its job at full speed and powerlines will carry the load.

 

[LodeRunner]

But you need to make sure it works with your home wiring. I think the two power outlets you want to connect using power-line adapters need to be on the same circuit breaker, otherwise it won't work.

This is very much a 'test it and find out' sort of thing; I have a fairly old generation Ethernet over Power Line pair and they are definitely not on the same breaker, but they'll do 60-70 Mbps.

 

[Stugots]

Pretty sure those only work on one phase of power at a time. Most US homes run 2-phase power, so if you have devices on both phases of the power they won't be able to talk to eachother. Pretty sure they sell devices to bridge the two phases to allow it to work, or else they'll only be able to connect when you have a 220V appliance running.

 

[zandor]

1Gb or faster with 300Mb service is really only useful if you have local traffic between machines. Like I have a file server so I can make use of more than 1Gb.

A few ideas aside from powerline adapters...

At 300Mbps a mesh kit ought to be able to handle it. If you can swing it spring for WiFi 6e and daisy chain them. 6e gets you the 6GHz band, and there are a ton more full bandwidth 6GHz channels than 5GHz. WiFi 6 could be iffy depending on how many units you need. All your devices and the mesh nodes would end up competing for space in the 5GHz range.

If the house is wired for cable (coaxial) you can use MoCA adapters. Point to point is the fastest, but they'll work with splitters. You just need to make sure all your splitters are MoCA compatible. MoCA uses higher frequencies than cable, so you need splitters that can handle higher frequencies than cable needs. If you have cable you'll also need a MoCA point of entry filter. They were like $10 last I checked. It's just a low pass filter that blocks MoCA signals from leaking out onto the cable company's lines and keeps neighbors from getting into your network via MoCA.

I'd suggest a mesh kit over extenders unless you're familiar with commercial access points or feel like learning how to set them up and want the extra features they offer. Most mesh kits will allow you to wire them, just check the specs. Both of those will enable fast roaming support, so your phones, laptops, etc. will switch nodes faster as you move around the house. Without fast roaming devices tend to stick to whatever node they're talking to rather than use the best one as long as the signal isn't too bad.

Are you sure you can't afford pulling ethernet? It's not hard to DIY unless you have to start tearing apart walls because you don't have an unfinished basement, drop ceiling, or attic to go through. You'll probably only need a couple hundred $ in cable, tools and parts for a half dozen drops. Putting plugs on cables is really tedious the first few times, but it's not hard to do. Jacks for wall plates are much easier. If you don't mind the (ugly) look and you're out in the country or in the right sort of neighborhood you can also string cables around the outside of the house. I've lived in a couple apartment buildings that were wrapped in exterior coax for cable TV. One caveat is that if you want to go through an attic you might want to use commercial WiFi equipment so you can get ceiling mount access points that support power over ethernet. I'm using ~$100 a pop TP-Link Omada EAP-610 AX1800 access points and have had good luck with them, meaning they're stable. Not the fastest, but all my desktops and my work laptop use wired connections so my WiFi is mostly just for gizmos and phones and 600Mb to my 2019 WiFi 5 laptop is good enough. Ubiquiti is also popular for home installations.

 

[TheSlySyl]

1Gb or faster with 300Mb service is really only useful if you have local traffic between machines. Like I have a file server so I can make use of more than 1Gb.

A few ideas aside from powerline adapters...

At 300Mbps a mesh kit ought to be able to handle it. If you can swing it spring for WiFi 6e and daisy chain them. 6e gets you the 6GHz band, and there are a ton more full bandwidth 6GHz channels than 5GHz. WiFi 6 could be iffy depending on how many units you need. All your devices and the mesh nodes would end up competing for space in the 5GHz range.

If the house is wired for cable (coaxial) you can use MoCA adapters. Point to point is the fastest, but they'll work with splitters. You just need to make sure all your splitters are MoCA compatible. MoCA uses higher frequencies than cable, so you need splitters that can handle higher frequencies than cable needs. If you have cable you'll also need a MoCA point of entry filter. They were like $10 last I checked. It's just a low pass filter that blocks MoCA signals from leaking out onto the cable company's lines and keeps neighbors from getting into your network via MoCA.

I'd suggest a mesh kit over extenders unless you're familiar with commercial access points or feel like learning how to set them up and want the extra features they offer. Most mesh kits will allow you to wire them, just check the specs. Both of those will enable fast roaming support, so your phones, laptops, etc. will switch nodes faster as you move around the house. Without fast roaming devices tend to stick to whatever node they're talking to rather than use the best one as long as the signal isn't too bad.

Are you sure you can't afford pulling ethernet? It's not hard to DIY unless you have to start tearing apart walls because you don't have an unfinished basement, drop ceiling, or attic to go through. You'll probably only need a couple hundred $ in cable, tools and parts for a half dozen drops. Putting plugs on cables is really tedious the first few times, but it's not hard to do. Jacks for wall plates are much easier. If you don't mind the (ugly) look and you're out in the country or in the right sort of neighborhood you can also string cables around the outside of the house. I've lived in a couple apartment buildings that were wrapped in exterior coax for cable TV. One caveat is that if you want to go through an attic you might want to use commercial WiFi equipment so you can get ceiling mount access points that support power over ethernet. I'm using ~$100 a pop TP-Link Omada EAP-610 AX1800 access points and have had good luck with them, meaning they're stable. Not the fastest, but all my desktops and my work laptop use wired connections so my WiFi is mostly just for gizmos and phones and 600Mb to my 2019 WiFi 5 laptop is good enough. Ubiquiti is also popular for home installations.

I have Ethernet going through my attic and have Ethernet jacks on my ceiling because it was, by far, the cheapest and easiest option to get Ethernet to every room of my house. Took maybe 2 hours and every room is wired for 10gb.

Honestly, the Ethernet jacks on the ceiling are barely noticeable, when they're being used, I usually snake them around the ceiling or behind a picture, screen, etc.

 

[SamirD]

Pretty sure those only work on one phase of power at a time. Most US homes run 2-phase power, so if you have devices on both phases of the power they won't be able to talk to eachother. Pretty sure they sell devices to bridge the two phases to allow it to work, or else they'll only be able to connect when you have a 220V appliance running.

I haven't seen any issues at my place in CA with some jacked up wiring where there's a lot of reversed polarity, no grounds, etc. I think the newest units since they're using the ground as well deal with phase issues out of the box.