Devolo strains to make electrical house wiring match four twisted pairs of gigabit Ethernet
I've reviewed many Powerline networking adapters over the years, and of these Devolo's are some of the best. I like the simplicity of its designs, and how they normally work out of the box without any encouragement. Where I've taken exception to Powerline equipment in the past is when gigabit Ethernet ports are added into the equation, ignoring that the technology isn't capable of that speed (or even half that level).
What was needed was a comparable Powerline performance, and now Devolo have developed a standard called Range+ that promises speeds approaching 1200Mb/s. It achieves this by utilising all three wires in Range+mode and a MIMO (multiple-input and multiple-output) configuration that effectively creates a dual 600Mbit channel-bonded network. That's the theory, but what's this actually like to use?
As a starter kit this is a very basic introduction to the technology, where you get two identical adapters that can each translate a single Ethernet port across the Powerline network. Devolo will undoubtedly do other 1200+ adapters with inbuilt wi-fi, but for now the equipment is ostensibly identical to its current line of dLAN 650+ adapters, with pass-through power connectors.
I like the pass-through, but really wish Devolo would mount the Ethernet ports on the bottom and not the top, for a tidier look. One difference is that Devolo has distilled the various LED lights seen on prior designs down to just a single one that can tell you if the connection is good, not so good or just not working.
In my tests I never saw 'not working' because, whatever else I may have to say about this equipment and the technology that underpins it, I can confirm it works - at least in the testing conditions that we presented it with. I was even able to get a connection on the other side of the consumer unit, not even on the same physical circuit.
However, more of an issue was getting anywhere near the promised speed rating of this technology. Using a benchmark test called LAN Speed Test 3.4, and set as baseline by testing my gigabit Ethernet adapter. The best that can do is around 500Mb/s writing and 700Mb/s reading from my HP N40L Micro Server.
Putting the house electrics and dLan 1200+ starter kit together, I first checked Devolo's own Cockpit software for a speed rating. It told me the two adapters were synced at 780Mbit/s. Yet, when I tested the link by file transfer the best scores I could achieve where in the 350Mb/s range. Therefore, even if 1200+ sounds like it should be enough to extend a gigabit network the reality shows it is short of the task in real world scenarios. One might reasonably conclude that it might be difficult to get even more bandwidth than this using Powerline technology and just three wires.
There's a danger here of looking this gift-horse in the mouth, and not accepting the real improvement over dLAN 650+ I've seen. It is better, though not perhaps as much improved as one might hope. So, the wait for true gigabit level performance over power goes on, even if we've taken another modest step towards it. Mark Pickavance
The fastest Powerline adapters yet.