Getting rid of WiFi

foofighter

foofighter

Jedi Council Member
Hi,

If you have read all the articles on the negative health effects of WiFi/wireless, you may want to get rid of this in your own house. Until now the alternatives I knew of were either having cables lying around the house (very inconvenient) or having a contractor install it in the walls (expensive). My house just got fiber to it, and the installer told us that there is now a third alternative: HomePlugs!

The idea is basically that you can use the electricity wires in your house as the network cables. The technology itself has been around for about 15 years, but it's only lately that it's been decently packaged and priced for consumer use. There is a HomePlug alliance homepage where you can read more about it:
_http://www.homeplug.org/home/

We got 6 units yesterday, which have the extra feature of AC passthrough so you don't "waste" a socket just for the network connectivity. Plugged in and just works. Highly recommended! Apart from fixing the health issues of WiFi, it also doesn't suffer from the range problems of WiFi (unless your house is 200m wide), and the speed of our unit is 200Mbps which is pretty good.

Searching on Amazon returns a whole range of available HomePlug products, although I can't find many that has the vital passthrough feature. The one we got was released just a couple of weeks ago from our manufacturer, and we had to go to the manufacturer outlet to buy it as it was not available in stores yet. In any case, it's better than using WiFi I suppose. Try it out!
 
This is a good alternative , however there are few limitations.
Bandwidth is limited to 10 mbit. In most cases even worse because of poor cabling.
Various electromagnetically 'noisy' gear will slow down or drop communication while turned on.
As an example , if you turn on a mixer you connection will stop working :D
Also , very often it will not work on older cable installations.
You also have to know if you have galvalnic/optical separator in you installation because it will not let you communicate if it is inline -> reciever - separator - transmiter.
I am also not sure if you can create a star topology with these technology. Last time I checked (few years ago) it was only point-to-point.

IMO , ethernet cable is a best solution.
 
drygol said:
Bandwidth is limited to 10 mbit. In most cases even worse because of poor cabling.
Click to expand...
Ours is 200Mbps, and there was a 1000Mbps option as well for media streamers. I haven't done any in-house checking, but have checked what I get towards internet, which is 10Mbps (=same as fiber to my house), which is all I need really for most purposes.

Various electromagnetically 'noisy' gear will slow down or drop communication while turned on.
As an example , if you turn on a mixer you connection will stop working :D
Click to expand...

Possibly, will have to experiment a bit to see how resilient it is.

I am also not sure if you can create a star topology with these technology. Last time I checked (few years ago) it was only point-to-point.
Click to expand...
The one we got, Aztech HomePlug, works like a hub, so basically any points you connect can see each other, as default. You can use a utility to create subnetworks if you want, but we don't need that for home use.

IMO , ethernet cable is a best solution.
Click to expand...
Maybe, but costly, takes contractors (if you want it in the walls, having cables lying around is not so nice), and you need to be really sure where to put the sockets. With the HomePlug you just add in whatever room you want.

It's a nice option to cables, is what I'm saying.
 
Oh i see that stuff is much more developed now !
great !

Let us know how it works on a long run.
 
Thanks for the info on alternatives to wifi. In our home it is difficult to avoid and everyone within home range uses it. So now, we turn it off for our computers and use extra long ethernet cables. Not convenient but certainly safer. For the cell phone we keep it off except when in use or when a call is expected. I've recently used one set time to check for phone messages daily. It means no instant response but that is not always a bad thing.

brainwave
 
Isn't there a way to forward your cell phone number to a corded house phone? That way when you're home you could turn off your cell phone and use the house phone only (not wireless house phones though, those are just as bad as cell phones).

You would either use *72 or #72 feature as described here:
_http://www.ehow.com/how_4473954_use-call-forwarding-home-phone.html

Or perhaps call your cell phone provider and ask them how to do it. Some cell phones have a call forwarding feature in them but I'm not sure if they have to be on and connected for it to work. The idea is that it is forwarded not in the phone's software itself but on your provider's equipment so that your cell phone can be off and the calls routed to your house phone instead.
 
brainwave said:
For the cell phone we keep it off except when in use or when a call is expected. I've recently used one set time to check for phone messages daily. It means no instant response but that is not always a bad thing.

brainwave
Click to expand...

Some operators propose an option to send you a mail when you have a message. Check yours.
 
Isn't there a way to forward your cell phone number to a corded house phone? That way when you're home you could turn off your cell phone and use the house phone only (not wireless house phones though, those are just as bad as cell phones).
Click to expand...

Yeah it can be easily done , but it is expensive ... unless operator gives you a good offer
 
foofighter said:
Hi,

If you have read all the articles on the negative health effects of WiFi/wireless, you may want to get rid of this in your own house. Until now the alternatives I knew of were either having cables lying around the house (very inconvenient) or having a contractor install it in the walls (expensive). My house just got fiber to it, and the installer told us that there is now a third alternative: HomePlugs!

The idea is basically that you can use the electricity wires in your house as the network cables. The technology itself has been around for about 15 years, but it's only lately that it's been decently packaged and priced for consumer use. There is a HomePlug alliance homepage where you can read more about it:
_http://www.homeplug.org/home/

We got 6 units yesterday, which have the extra feature of AC passthrough so you don't "waste" a socket just for the network connectivity. Plugged in and just works. Highly recommended! Apart from fixing the health issues of WiFi, it also doesn't suffer from the range problems of WiFi (unless your house is 200m wide), and the speed of our unit is 200Mbps which is pretty good.

Searching on Amazon returns a whole range of available HomePlug products, although I can't find many that has the vital passthrough feature. The one we got was released just a couple of weeks ago from our manufacturer, and we had to go to the manufacturer outlet to buy it as it was not available in stores yet. In any case, it's better than using WiFi I suppose. Try it out!
Click to expand...

Hi Foofighter--I would like to look into the plug-ins, but I would like to know first, if all the sockets in the room being used for a computer, need a plug in or do you just need one--for the socket normally used? I noticed you said you got 6 of them.
I am staying in a studio apt. at a large B&B where the owner has the Wifi cranked up.
 
SolarMother said:
Hi Foofighter--I would like to look into the plug-ins, but I would like to know first, if all the sockets in the room being used for a computer, need a plug in or do you just need one--for the socket normally used? I noticed you said you got 6 of them.
I am staying in a studio apt. at a large B&B where the owner has the Wifi cranked up.
Click to expand...
Yeah you put one in the socket normally used and then connect the computer to the HomePlug. Just make sure the units have this AC passthrough feature or it won't work.
 
I'm not scientifically educated on these matters, but the thing I worry about with systems like these is that the power cables in your home, which are used to transport the network signal, are basically going to behave like radio frequency transmitters, sending out the signal as RF as well as transporting it via the wire to the connected devices.

This is because at the high frequencies used, the power cabling, which is not designed for transmitting high frequency signals, will act as a sending antenna, sending out RF waves. At 200Mbit for instance the signal could very well have a signal frequency of 200MHz, but this could be a lot higher when extra data is transmitted for error correction and such. It could also be much lower, when the signal is transmitted using more signal levels than two. So, it's a guess, but let's say the frequency used to transmit the signal is 200MHz. Frequencies as high as these "leak" out of the cables. When measurements are done in a lab on high frequency signals it appears that a big part of the signal is actually traveling "around" the cable to it's destination as opposed to through it. The higher the frequency, the starker this effect is. That is why normal radio antenna cables or television antenna cables have a single core for the signal, and grounded shielding around it to prevent signal going out or coming in.

In layman's terms, a system like this could very well be like an energy saving light bulb or a simple dimmer, which aren't designed to transmit radio waves, but do.

On the other hand (and again, I'm not educated in physics enough to know all the ins and outs about RF signals and RF propagation) a lot of normal network cables leak signal as well, and I don't know if this effect is more or less than with the power cables in your wall. Unshielded twisted pair cables, which are the normal kind of network cable, do this to some extent. Shielded cables are best, because the shielding prevents distorting signals coming in and RF signals going out, though not all of it. I think (but I don't know for sure) that Gigabit Ethernet cables are most often shielded (and twisted, for that matter). By the way, two decades ago network cables looked a lot like those television antenna cables, with a single copper core for the signal and shielding around it. That was before the switch to twisted pair cables which is the type of cable most people use today.

Oh and by the way, I still think it is probably a lot better than that nasty Wifi.. that stuff gives me headaches. Don't know how it compares to shielded network cables though. It would be great to do some measurements, but I have neither a system like this nor the equipment to measure RF.

[edited to correct some assumptions I made, which I disproved after looking it up]
 
Thanks for the ideas shared here.

The only problem with trying to get rid of WiFi in our home is that the wireless signals are still all around us. I've just moved to a new home, and long before Comcast arrived to set up my Internet cable, I was "connected" because of my neighbor's wireless network. And what about all those wireless cell phone networks which say, "No matter where you are, we've got you covered!"? It sounds like a promise of "service," but in fact it feels like a threat!
 
Elizabeth said:
The only problem with trying to get rid of WiFi in our home is that the wireless signals are still all around us. I've just moved to a new home, and long before Comcast arrived to set up my Internet cable, I was "connected" because of my neighbor's wireless network. And what about all those wireless cell phone networks which say, "No matter where you are, we've got you covered!"? It sounds like a promise of "service," but in fact it feels like a threat!
Click to expand...

Far you are, better it is. The power of the signal decrease with the square of the distance.
 
I'm not scientifically educated on these matters, but the thing I worry about with systems like these is that the power cables in your home, which are used to transport the network signal, are basically going to behave like radio frequency transmitters, sending out the signal as RF as well as transporting it via the wire to the connected devices.
Click to expand...

it still should be way better than pure wifi beacuse metal is a better medium so it transmits small signals better than air. It would be a problem if large power is involved , but its not.
Also , I don't know how about other countries , but where I live , there are metal rods put into concrete walls so it gives you additional shielding.
 
Or perhaps call your cell phone provider and ask them how to do it. Some cell phones have a call forwarding feature in them but I'm not sure if they have to be on and connected for it to work. The idea is that it is forwarded not in the phone's software itself but on your provider's equipment so that your cell phone can be off and the calls routed to your house phone instead.
Click to expand...

Yea, that's right, you can just turn on the call forwarding. This service is available at most of the operators. I have some experience at the telecommunication field & can assure you, that this feature is working even on Africa's operator infrastructures. :) This feature is treated as the request to the operator network and the phone can be switched off just after activation. Probably you'll be paying for every call forwarded as a call from your cell phone to your land line.
 
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