How Does Powerline Ethernet Work?

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as awesomely convenient as wi-fi is it

certainly isn't without its shortcomings

random dropouts crummy speeds and

limited range are all potential problems

especially if you live somewhere with

thick walls or lots of interfering

signals

i mean you could just run ethernet

cables everywhere

but that can be a messy solution and uh

good luck suing yourself for pain and

suffering when you trip over one on the

way to get a g fuel refill in the middle

of the night

but what if i told you

an elegant way to solve this problem is

already built right into your house even

if you don't have a newfangled home with

ethernet outlets in the walls

i'm talking of course about power line

adapters devices which send data signals

over your home's electrical wiring it's

like whoa

dude

like isn't all that copper wiring in

your walls busy carrying you know like

power

well

great question surfer linus it turns out

that like sound pitch or the frequency

of a wi-fi band ac power has its own

waveform with a frequency of 50 or 60

hertz depending on where you live

so power powerline ethernet works by

simply sending signals through your

wiring at very different frequencies

with modern implementations of the

technology between 2 and 86 megahertz

kind of like how dsl internet provides

high speed internet access over the same

wiring as your landline phone by using a

different frequency you can learn more

about that up here

and although electrical wiring in your

house connects lots of different devices

instead of being a strictly

point-to-point connection like

conventional ethernet

power line adapters have internal logic

that allows them to catch the signal

kind of like your smartphone or laptop

can catch a wi-fi signal that spreads

out in all directions

well that's great and convenient in all

linus but how fast is it

well

although the theoretical maximum of the

newest revision of power line is about

two gigabits per second your real-world

performance will probably top out at

around 100 to 200 megabits although this

is still definitely fast enough for

high-speed internet browsing and even 4k

streaming and from my personal

experience it comes with a consistency

and latency advantage over wi-fi

now with all that said if the wiring in

your house is older or not the best

quality or if you are trying to place

two adapters very far from each other

your speeds might drop well below 100

megabit due to signal degradation so i

recommend buying your first couple of

powerline adapters from a retailer with

a solid return policy before making a

full commitment

there are also a few caveats to keep in

mind when setting up a home powerline

network

whatever you do plug your adapters

directly into the wall devices like ups

battery backups power conditioners and

surge protectors can mis-identify your

data signal as

undesirable electrical noise and

actually filter it out also be sure to

follow the instructions provided for

securing your powerline network with a

password especially if you aren't living

in a fully detached home

just like your neighbor can easily

access your wi-fi network if it's not

password protected anybody who shares an

electrical circuit with you even through

a breaker panel can possibly get into

your power line network this is a common

problem in apartments

lastly if you're looking to optimize

your speeds try different combinations

of outlets if possible some work better

than others and high draw devices like

microwaves on the same circuit can

actually cause slowdowns and remember

that less is more for powerline because

running many many adapters can cause

network congestion similar to old-school

ethernet hubs

and sadly there's not a quick

over-the-counter pill that can fix uh

network congestion

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