Need Some Help Wiring Your Home?

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    In the meantime, short of hiring a professional, consumers are left to consult books, websites or knowledgeable friends and neighbors. Almita and Jim Ranstrom, retirees in their 70s who live on Vashon Island near Seattle and run a computer club, refer their members to The Little Network Book by Lon Poole and John Rizzo and invite people over to look at their home network. "Some people are still intimidated by their computers," says Almita. "It's not that what you're doing is hard; it's all the jargon."

    Hackler believes some consumers need not only easier installation but also a better reason to network than just sharing Net access--something as simple as connecting speakers in the bedroom to the stereo downstairs. That kind of connectivity, experts agree, is the future of the industry. Imagine that instead of routers and hubs near the computers in the den, you had a souped-up TV set-top box equipped with its own broadband Internet connection and networking capabilities--and that this "gateway" connected not just the family PCs and printers but also the stereo, dvd player and Xbox video console, even the house alarm and central air conditioning.

    "As networks expand, any device in your home that has a microprocessor in it could potentially hook up to your home network, either for content delivery or home automation," says Chris Kaminski, editor and founder of HomeNetHelp.com , a networking-advice website based in Ferndale, Mich. In such a setup, the computer becomes a peripheral, just one other machine being fed from the outside. And your broadband-service provider would become your source for movies, music and games. The first step is to establish standards that allow providers to deliver these services to individual homes and control how content is used and distributed throughout that home's network. A cable standard is already in the works, but it's at least a year away.

    Manufacturers are already starting to promote the idea of the residential gateway and introducing devices that would take advantage of it. Sony makes a digital TV set-top box with a built-in cable modem for Cablevision. Last November Sony unveiled its new WEGA TV, which can download programs from a wireless network hub. In January, Moxi Digital, a start-up, unveiled the Moxi Media Center, a network-ready set-top box with a built-in personal video recorder (think TiVo), DVD player, MP3 jukebox and a receiver for cable or satellite TV. EchoStar is expected to be the first dealer to distribute it later this year.

    While they await a critical mass of customers for these gadgets, some cable companies are trying to boost revenues by charging customers $5 to $7 a month for each additional computer that's connected to their network. That fee pays for a separate Internet protocol address (a line out to the Net) for that computer. But moves like that have prompted criticism that these cable companies are trying to squeeze a few extra bucks out of their networking customers without adding any real value. Amori argues that such an approach is risky to boot, as the system could compromise security by exposing each computer to hackers. If you want to set up a network, he says, it's best to share one IP address and hide everyone behind a firewall security software program.

    If you want to network, perhaps it's best just to leave your broadband provider out of it. O'Neill says her high-speed cable operator didn't offer any network support yet wanted to sell her IP addresses. "That," she says, "is a dead end." The companies that win the competition to network America's homes will be the ones that offer something truly useful or entertaining in return for all those extra charges.

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