So for the benefit of others who may stumble upon this thread and find themselves in the same boat. Here is a quick over view of how power line adaptors came to be and work in different iterations.
- Gen 1: These units required at least three units to operate one at the router / switch. Two on either leg of the split single phase electrical system. These 1st generation units had no encryption or linking what so ever. These units also did not acquire any IP addressing or broadcast the same.
- Gen 2: These units increased the output (signal) power on the 120 / 240 VAC line and also incorporated digital transport layer. They incorporated encryption to offer security and privacy. Units not linked to one another will not pass any data. Some of these generation 2 hardware began to adopt more networking attributes such as DHCP / Fixed IP.
- Gen 3: These units added RF (Dual Band) to help bridge the 120 / 240 VAC line at the zero line crossing. Doing so would help on paper to increase the range, reliability, and throughput. These latest generation increased the encryption strength from 128 ~ 256 -> 1028 bit encryption and used different cyphers. They also require each unit to be linked so a secure network can be attained and allow data to pass. Generation 3 hardware all incorporate network broadcasting and other attributes such as VLAN etc. It should be made clear the RF portion was not created to provide WiFi so an end device to connect to the same like a
Access Point /
Repeater.
- Gen 4: The biggest change in these units was incorporating WiFi to help
Repeat the homes wireless connection. It's safe to state every vendor markets and touts something different about their hardware vs the competitor. As stated earlier a repeater is not the same as a mesh wireless network.
A repeater (generally speaking) takes a incoming signal no matter good or bad and
tries to repeat the same. It doesn't boost the signal nor can it make a bad WiFi signal better. A mesh wireless network (generally speaking) is deployed in large geographic manner where if a person is in the coverage area 1 will receive a solid signal. If the same person leaves area 1 but enters area 2 depending upon how its set up the signal will drop from area 1 and connect to area 2 and so forth.
Best practices of any mesh network is to have enough over lap where there isn't any dead spots. So to the average person roaming around a large building they would simply think the WiFi is awesome because they always see 5 bars!
Regardless, of all of back ground information there are a few things that stand out and is still unclear to me.
- Connection: How do you know what connection is being made from the power line adapter?? A simple test is to delete the WiFi enrollment from both units. Doing so will assure your network connection is only through the powerline. That same powerline is connected directly to your LAN via the router.
Try that and report back the results . . .
NOTE: One other advancement in powerline Ethernet is the introduction of POE Power Line. Probably one of the best technologies invented for the Average Joe if used correctly.
