hotelwifi

Looking for "Home Plug" knowledgeable people.

I'm looking for efficient ways to hook up WiFi in hotels and need some info on Home Plug technology.

Here is the scenereio...

In a hotel, most WiFi installers usually go from:

Internet > Internet gateway > switch > CAT 5 cable > hidden access points (hidden so they won't be stolen)

or

Internet > Internet gateway > switch > CAT 5 cable > ethernet wall jacks in hotel rooms

One big expense is the installation of CAT 5 cable going to the switch. There is a technology with a generic name called Home Plug. This converts the ethernet output out of the switch to a special signal that can ride over the AC wiring in a hotel.

You can take a special device in each hotel room that will extract this special signal into an ethernet signal again. In effect you have extended the ethernet signal from the switch to the hotel room.

Different manufacturers call their Home Plug equipment different names.

On the surface this seems to be a pretty good way to extend ethernet signals from the switch...at least if you want the signals in each h otel room. So this is good for a wired system.

But...

If you want wireless, it seems to me that this home plug system can be more expensive then stringing CAT 5 cables to the hidden access points, which are usually in hidden locations in dropped cielings...where there is no AC plug from which to extract the ethernet signal.

So if a hotel wants wireless, then you must hire an electrician to install AC outlets where each access point is located.

Plus the injection point for the signals must be done by an electrician.

All this can add on to the expense considerably in a hotel situation as compared to just stringing CAT 5 cables.

Plus Home Plug still doesn't do away with the Internet gateway and the switch, nor the access points if you want wireless.

It's just an efficient way to get ethernet to the rooms. But if you want to get ethernet to the access points (which are usually not in rooms to prevent theaft), then it seems to me that you have added on to your expenses considerably if you use Home Plug as compared to just stringing CAT 5 cables. This is assuming the CAT 5 cables can be easily strung (which they usually can).

One company that sells Home Plug is Telkonet in MD. Their advertising makes it look like a total solution, when it really is just a method to extend the ethernet over the AC power lines in hotels. They still need an Internet gateway and switch...and access points if they are going to be wireless. Plus you have to add AC power recepticles next to the hidden access points in a hotel, which is more expense.

So I'd love to hear the pros and cons of Home Plug. To help educate me on this subject.

Just in case I'm in a situation where the hotel owner wants just wired ethernet in a hotel room, who is a good company that makes this equipment, whereby I can still use my own Internet gateway and my own switch.

Does this Home Plug distribution of the ethernet signals over the AC power lines act as just one big switch (as opposed to a hub, which is less efficient and slower)?

This seems to me that this would be much slower then using CAT 5 lines from a switch to the access points.

Also I would think this method of power line distribution is LESS SECURE since the ac power lines also go outdoors where other people could access the signal and hack into the system.

Thanks so much for any help on this.

wrzwaldo

hotelwifi

Is HomePlug Powerline a low security way to transmit converted ethernet over ac powerlines?

Ethernet is encoded and put on the powerlines of a hotel lets say.

Then in the h otel rooms a device is used to get the encoded signal off the powerline and converted back to ethernet again.

But this signal is a signal that radiates as compared to a signal like VDSL that rides on the telephone lines of a hotel.

Both VDSL and HomePlug Powerline are two different ways to get ethernet to a hotel room.

But I'm suspicious about the security of the HomePlug powerline.

I believe it uses frequencies from around 4 MHz to around 10 Mhz? I might be off some on those frequencies. But they radiate.

As such someone could pick them up on a shortwave receiver and maybe decode them.

So while they might be a low cost way to get ethernet to a hotel room, it sure seems very low security to me.

Unless there is some special encryption going on.

Maybe someone can tell me how this works and if it is low security.

Thanks

hotelwifi

Thank you so much for that link.

hotelwifi

I found out one company uses a coupler after the gateway and not a switch.

This looks like all the devices hanging on all the ac wiring are hooked into one big hub (as opposed to a switch).

But I need to learn more about the technology to be sure.

hotelwifi

I was reading that Telkonet has their own propritary Internet gateway.

Only problem is that I don't think it has all the features like the industry standard Nomadix does.

I didn't read anything that said it can have a Terms of Service page.

I didn't see that it can have forced URL for advertisment for a hotel.

Or have a history of usage in a day.

It looks like Telkonet's Internet gateway may not have the expected industry features of the Nomadix.

I don't believe the Nomadix can be used in place of the Telkonet Internet gateway (to get the good Nomadix features), since I think the Telkonet gateway is propritary.

Maybe I missed it. I'm going to try to get more info on it.

hotelwifi

Gee. I originally posted all my questions about Home Plug. But from my research I found some good info researching on the Internet using Google.

I kind of answered some of my own questions. But I'm posting all this here to help other people who may have questions about Home Plug...aka BPL, etc.

I'm educating myself on thie BPL stuff, since I have 3 hotels I have to do proposals for and I know that one of my competitors is offering BPL. The hotel owner doesn't know about all this radiation and interference from BPL.

I found this very interesting link on the ARRL web site regarding interference from Powerline Ethernet...aka HomePlug...and also BPL (Broadband Over Power Line). I think BPL may be the better technological name.

»www.arrl.org/tis/info/HTML/plc/aud-vid..

I knew there was interference and it radiated so it could be picked up on a radio receiver, but I didn't realize it was this bad.

This video shows BPL outdoors. But the BPL in hotels looks to be the same technology.

Pick the link at the top.

Also from my analysis, it looks like BPL can be more expensive when it feeds access points that are properly hidden up in drop ceilings, since AC power must be put there to deliver the ethernet to each AP.

All that BPL cost (for hotels that want wireless, will be much more expensive then just deploying CAT 5 cable. Plus there is no radiation interference from CAT 5 cable as there is with BPL.

Who is to say what a hacker can do with a BPL signal once he receives it on his HF or VHF radio? So is it really secure?