Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)WD's Livewire Powerline little boxes allow for high-speed data flow over your residence's electrical wiring with ZERO setup - something that would have been viewed as a miracle or an impossibility only a few years ago. Anyone (such as myself) who currently relies on 'wireless' to connect various devices could use Livewire Powerline for those networked appliances that either can't connect wirelessly (many Bluray players and TV sets) or a high bandwidth channel is needed to stream HD content.
Before making a 'buy' decision, it is important to understand that Livewire will NOT significantly improve 'Internet' performance unless your ISP provides you with a very large bandwidth. If your Wi-Fi router supports 802.11g, you will get an average throughput of 22 Mbit/s which is more than most ISP can provide for Internet bandwidth. In other words, your Wi-Fi router should usually handle whatever the Internet may throw at you with some room to spare and whether you get your ISP's 10 Mbit/s data stream over at 22 Mbit/s from Wi-Fi or at 200 Mbit/s from Livewire Powerline it's still... 10 Mbit/s or close. On the other hand, streaming form your media server at will make all the difference in the world when compared with your Wi-Fi throughput.WHO NEEDS IT?
To summarize, you will BENEFIT from Liverwire Powerline when:
- You stream from YOUR media server
- Have some Internet-ready device that does not support Wi-Fi and your home is not 'wired' for Ethernet
- You have a big house or for whatever reason Wi-Fi can't reach some specific device or the reception is poor
- You have a VERY HIGH bandwidth Internet connection
You will NOT BENEFIT from Liverwire Powerline to connect to the Internet via a 'normal' broadband link and, of course, if your house is already wired for Ethernet.MY EXPERIENCE
To evaluate WD's Livewire Powerline I decided that I will first try it without reading the manual (a .pdf) or installing whatever software came on CD. To my surprise, I was able to set it all up and get it running in a few minutes. Still haven't looked at the CD.
In the box you find the 2 little (literally) identical Liverwire Powerline boxes, 2 power cords and 2 short (too short) Ethernet wires. And... yes a CD that should have some software that you COULD install and use if you had trouble setting things up. The boxes have 4 RJ-45 (not phone jacks) ports, an On/Off switch set to On by default (no need to ever set it to off) and some little lights that blink whenever there is data traffic.My setup and installation proceeded as follows:
- I connected the power cords to the boxes
- On each of the 2 boxes I connected one end of the Ethernet wires to one port on the box
- I placed one of the boxes near my router in the basement and connected the other end of the Ethernet wire to one of the router's ports
- I plugged the power cord into a wall outlet - must NOT plug it into a power strip or surge protector, it MUST go directly into the wall outlet
- I attached the Ethernet wire of the other box to my PS3 upstairs
- I plugged this box's power cord into the wall outlet
Once the above was done, I turned on my PS3 and set it to use the 'wired' connection. It recognized it within seconds and I was pleased to see the Internet test indicating an 8.2 Mbit/s, better than the 5.6 Mbit/s I had over the Wi-Fi. But that was not all. The big improvement was when I played a video off the media server located in the basement: flawlessly playing our 720p home videos over the new connection vs. choppy before over Wi-Fi.
As expected, the PS3 benefited but only to a small degree when it came to the Internet stream - it did benefit because the Wi-Fi signal strength was only 63% - and it benefited tremendously when media streaming was between in-house devices.
With 4 RJ-45 ports available, I am considering now getting a dedicated Blu-ray player and will not have to specifically seek one that had Wi-Fi built-in.MY EVALUATION
As far as I am concerned (see my experience notes above) Livewire Powerline is in many ways the perfect gadget. It does its magic, it does it well and 'the rest of us' don't need to bother with manuals or spend hours on hold with tech support - WD does provide a tech support phone number and a Web site if you get yourself into trouble.
I do not expect not think about this device again until I get my Blu-ray player. Like my Linksys router, I expect it to sit there, largely forgotten and gathering dust behind the entertainment center and do its job without me worrying about it at all. Which makes it perfect. And the price is not that bad either.
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NOTE: WD claims that this will allow you to stream HD on your home network. This is true but be aware that not all HDs are equal. You will NOT be able to stream Blu-ray quality 1080p with 7.1 uncompressed sound - you will need 'Gigabit Ethernet' for that. You should have no problem streaming 720p with 2 channel stereo sound, which is what you are likely to produce as a 'home' video.
NOTE 2: I only tested with 2 boxes but I know of at least one person (my boss actually) who has 4 such boxes (an older model) in his house and happens to be very happy with the setup.
NOTE 3: See a discussion on my statement that "you will NOT be able to stream Blu-ray quality 1080p with 7.1 uncompressed sound" in the 'comments' sections of this review.
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Western Digital WD Livewire Powerline AV Network KitWd livewire powerline av network kit extends the internet to any room using your home's electrical outlets. stream the highest quality hd video, play games, and transfer files within the home or over the internet using secure and reliable high-speed connections. get the performance of a wired network without running wires.
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