MaximumPC 2008 04

W

ith 802.11n Draft 2.0 routers and wireless network adapters

becoming both ubiquitous and relatively inexpensive—and

with 802.11n media center extenders finally reaching the market—

you might be wondering if building an old-fashioned wired network is

worth the trouble and expense.

There’s no question that stringing wires around your house is a

royal pain, especially if it lacks a crawl space or attic, and if you’re

going to bother with a wired network at all, you’ll need to invest in a

gigabit switch (any 802.11n router worth its salt has a built-in gigabit

switch, but you’ll need more than four measly ports). You’ll also need

to buy bulk Cat5e cable, RJ45 jacks, mud rings, wall plates, and per-

haps a few new tools.

We decided to compare the deployment cost, convenience, and

performance of a wireless network powered by a high-end Wi-Fi

router with that of a wired network controlled by a high-quality gigabit

switch in four usage scenarios.

Wired vs. Wireless

STREAMING AUDIO

Wireless technology is the clear winner here,

simply because streaming audio is not a

demanding application. There’s more than

enough bandwidth on even an 802.11g

network to stream high-quality stereo music

(we’re talking tracks encoded with a lossless

codec such as FLAC), and that makes it easy

to deploy speakers and a wireless streamer (a

Squeezebox, for instance) just about anywhere

in your home.

You could do the same thing with a wired

network, of course, but unless you’re building

your home from scratch, you’re not likely to

deploy Ethernet to every room. And the more

ports you install, the bigger the switch you’ll

need to buy to connect them.

WINNER: WIRELESS NETWORK

WIRELESS NETWORK

Linksys WRT600N

802.11n Draft 2.0 Router

$250, http://www.linksys.com

STREAMING VIDEO

Streaming video obviously requires much more bandwidth than streaming music, especially when you move up

to high-definition video with multichannel audio. Depending on your home environment and the distance you

need to stream, you might find that streaming 1080p video with 5.1-channel audio is just not possible, even with

an 802.11n router operating on the 5GHz frequency band.

You’ll have no problem whatsoever shooting that digital stream down a stretch of Cat5e cable, provided you

don’t need to send it more than 328 feet (the maximum certifiable cable length). It’s unlikely you’ll have a televi-

sion or monitor in every room of your house, so stringing cable to a few locations—the family room, bedrooms,

and kitchen, for example—won’t require a significant investment of time or money.

WINNER: WIRED NETWORK

round^1

round^2

BY MICHAEL BROWN

LOCAL AREA NETWORKS

head 22 head TWO TECHNOLOGIES ENTER, ONE TECHNOLOGY LEAVES

14 MAMAMAXIMXIMXIMXIMUUUUMMPPPCC | APR 08 | http://www.maximumpc.com