Customer Reviews

ZyXEL PLA470 200 Mbps Powerline HomePlug AV Desktop Adapter with Built-In 4-Port 10/100 Fast Ethernet Switch

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

It's true that HomePlug AV nodes cannot intercommunicate with HomePlug 1.0 nodes. ZyXEL and most, if not all, other HomePlug AV hardware manufacturers are derelict in not pointing out that fact. As an engineer who works with HomePlug almost full-time, I know that AV kicks 1.0's tail in terms of bitrate versus SNR. That doesn't excuse ZyXEL's dereliction, but it gives you cause to ponder retiring your HomePlug 1.0 hardware and replacing it with HomePlug AV hardware. Even if you think you won't benefit sufficiently from HomePlug AV's nominal 14x bitrate improvement, you might need AV's ability to reach more electrical outlets in your building with a bitrate that is usable for your application.

There's another compatibility matter to be aware of. When I examined a new PLA-470 the other day, I was disappointed, but not surprised, to find that the version of firmware installed in the HomePlug AV chipset is an old, pre-standard version, 1.4.5, that is not truly HomePlug-AV compliant and, more importantly, that cannot intercommunicate with subsequent firmware versions. I have not checked to see whether ZyXEL provides the means to upgrade the firmware of the HomePlug-AV chipset. The newest version is 3.0.5. For more detail on the topic of HomePlug-AV-chipset firmware, see my review of the Linksys PLE200.

I share a house with a roommate and live on the second floor. My room is big enough for my 46" HDTV but the problem is when I try to connect my Xbox to the Internet, I can't get a clear signal from the Linksys router downstairs that connects to the cable modem. And my roommate who owns the modem and the router likes to change the wireless set up like every two weeks. So I don't have a stable Internet connection.

So I bought a Zyxel Pla400 and a Pla470 powerline adapter and switch. I plugged the Pla400 adapter to the cable modem and used the pla470 switch in my room on the second floor to connect my xbox, desktop and external storage. That's it - I did not have to do any additional setup. The whole process took 5 minutes. Now my xbox and desktop are connected to the cable modem over electrical lines. The connection is very fast and stable.

So now it doesn't matter how many times my roommate changes the settings on her wireless router, I just play my Xbox any time I want in my room with the big TV.

I bought a PLA401Kit, a PLA470 4-port, and a DMA1100 for my home setup. Hooking up the PLA401 near my broadband router was a cinch. To test the system, I ran into the other room and plugged in the 2nd PLA401...five seconds later my ethernet connection was recognized...WOW!

I bought the PLA470 for my media room downstairs. The media room is the farthest spot away from my wireless router and neither my netbook nor my ROKU box (streaming Netflix) could pick up any signal in the room. I hoped the ZyXel system could get me online. This system works so well it literally brought a grin to my face. I chose the PLA470 because of it's 4-port connection. I plan to wire lines for my families notebook connections (yes we're online while watching movies). This setup allows all of us to be online at once downstairs.

I also installed the DMA1100 media server into the media room. This took a little longer to connect because I had to configure Windows Media Server but after about one hour I was listening to my MP3 collection, watching my digital moview and running a digital photo slide-show on my 111" projection screen all from my home office computer upstairs. I am also streaming HiDef movies over my broadband through the powerlines in my house; the whole thing is cooler than I ever could have imagined.

I cannot recommend this system enough. It's so easy to set-up and use and it runs faster than I could have imagined.

UPDATE2: OK, I am happy this review has helped some folks out there, its been more than 6 months since I got the V2 from the RMA dept. Since then, no issues, I will keep updating this review, however, since this is for the regular version of the product it doesn't make sense for me to review the V2 here... again no problems so far. I want to upgrade the stars to 2 because I am extremely satisfied with Zyxel's customer service, and at the end of the day, although the product died rather quickly I got the replacements and the service as expected. In other words... I don't "hate" the product... so, 2 stars now :) I am also adding some more detailed attributes rating.

UPDATE: After I RMA'd the product for the second time, this time they sent me a brand new PLA-470 V2 back, I have to say although I am not happy I had to return twice the PLA-470, Zyxel's service is outstanding. Even now they sent me a V2 at no cost, they do acknowledge their issues and stand by their service. Really great, KUDOS for Zyxel service. I am going now to connect my new V2 :) So although I do not recommend the PLA-470 due to the technical problems it came with, I recommend zyxel no questions asked. As far as my experience with the V2, I am just going to start using it :) so we'll see, I'll update this review accordingly.

I bought the PLA-470 through amazon 1 year and 8 months ago. The product comes with a 2 year warranty at this time I still have 4 months worth of warranty. Last year, after about 6 to 8 months of fine operation (I will get to that below) the PLA just stopped working, it would create the link with the home network, but once I connected an ethernet cable to it, the product would start disconnecting every 10 seconds... making the connection completely unusable.

Let me start by saying, this is NOT a cheap product, Zyxel has a reputation for good quality, so I am not sure what went wrong with this but at the time I am writing this review, the product broke again exactly the same way, and let me be clear, the first time this happened, they sent me a new one, completely NEW, yet I have the same problem again? with a different unit? what does that tell you? clearly this line of products have a defect. Interestingly enough, I noticed they now sell a PLA-470 V2, and they don't sell the PLA-470 any more, yet amazon doesn't display the V2 and doesn't clarify if what you buy -today- is the new one or the old one...

Some disclosure: I am systems engineer so you can rest at ease that I have enough networking knowledge to know what I am doing (If I can setup the infrastructure to serve 20 million people I think I can do OK with my home power line connection to my basement...#

So today is Saturday, Zyxel is closed on saturdays, I guess I'll have to wait until monday and see if I can get a new unit that will last again 6 months.

For what its worth: During the 6 months of operation it works fine, is not as fast as advertised and as other reviewers have said it always depends on the condition of your power wires in your house #how old, etc# and the distance. Also it will probably work better if your origin device is part of the same line this one is connected to. I suspects these things cannot handle being -on- 24/7 which is my case #and my need# and probably thats why they are breaking every 6 months. The life period of the products is really short and its extremely delicate, not your average user home quality product. Some numbers, when it was working, I could get between 60 to 90 mpbs. Never really reached the 200MBPS. but it was still more consistent than my N wi-fi downstairs, so video would not lag and would not jump between my media server #upstairs# and my home theater devices downstairs #mac mini, xbox360 and PS3).

I wish this wouldn't break so fast, otherwise I would've given it the 4 stars because when it works, it works not as fast as they claim it does. Too bad you never know when its going to die on you! specially on a weekend..

I don't recommend buying this product unless you are buying it conciusly that you are getting into an RMA game every 6 months... and what happens when your warranty goes? you are left with a piece of junk.

Cheers and good luck

As other reviewers have said these work as advertised - for a little while. My biggest issue is the quality. These (as well as the various other half dozen Zyxel HomePlug adapters models I have) Homeplug adapters run too hot and to make matters worse the case only provides a minimum of circulation. All they Zyxel products seem to run too hot. The engineers don't seem to know heat rises and put the tiny vents are on the sides meaning heat builds up in the case so unless you mount this vertically it makes a nice heater.

My first unit died after 8 months, then the replacement died after 2 months so I am on my 3rd unit in less than a year. I have had similar issues with the other Zyxel Homeplug products. They are just not reliable.

On paper and price wise they are great but if I had to do it over again I would have bought a more reliable brand. Their software and documentatoin is also bad news.

I would recommend avoiding all Zyxel products until they get their act together. It would be interesting to have the people who reviewed Zyxel poducts do another review after owning them for a year to see home many are still working.

The only good thing about these is that they have a 2 year warranty so I calcualte I can get my hardware swapped out 2 more times before my warranty expires !

Wife wants WIFI switched off for health concerns. Netflix streaming wasn't that great either on wifi.
Started looking at Wired networking options.
Decided to try powerline before spending big bucks on MOCA. Running new Cat5e/6 cables behind the walls sounded way beyond my league.
Bought this along with a pair of PLA401v3 adapters. The PLA401v3s were pure plug n plays. Hooked up with my router in one room. Hooked up my desktop upstairs with the other adapter. Was up and running with connection to the Internet on my PC in no time.

Next step was to hook this switch to my Directv receiver and WII Box (use it for Netflix Streaming). Although the lights turned green, WII box connection kept failing. Read the yellow note in the box about firmware mismatch and resulting connection failures. Inserted CD from box into PC to run software. Software asks me to download latest version from Internet. Struggled for a long time looking for the right files to download. Firmware upgrade was anything but straightforward and lots of possibilities to goof up. After lots of digging thru instructions, it became clear the adapters were at a higher watermark and I had to upgrade the firmware on the switch. The yellow note inside the box indicated it's most likely to be the other way round.

No hiccups since the upgrade. Netflix streaming works great now. Will keep the review updated with any new events of interest.

P.S. Unless you already have Ethernet cables, please plan on buying some. The ones that came with the box both for the switch and the adapters were too short for most of my connection needs.

bought two of this from another online seller to connect between basement and 2nd floor. you will need to do test speed to find the best two power outlet to connect this thing. It is very picky and does not like any fan or other high power draw unit like your sound amplifier.
The first two units need to be sent back for a firmware upgrade.
Then it works for a few months but will lose connection very often after that even with low traffic.
I had to go back to wireless router 802.11G that provide better performance then these.

I tried to use this thing just for 5-port ethernet switch, but it will reboot every few minutes. a completely useless device.
The second time I contacted Zyxel they do not respond after I let them know that this is the PL470 v1 units even though it is still in warranty.
No more zyxel items for me from now one.

I recently bought this adapter/switch to extend my powerline network to my living room. I already had a couple of TRENDnet adapters that I had been using to use some servers in my garage. The Zyxel PLA-470 worked very well with these adapters. This should be no surprise since HomePlug AV is a standard and both devices were HomePlug AV compliant, but I just wanted to reassure those of you who might have concerns about intereoperability of different brands.
The switch has a pleasing design and the build quality looks great. I found it particularly nice that HomePlug AV devices typically don't need bulky power adapters since the power cord is also the powerline connection: one less wall-wart behind the TV.
Highly recommended overall!

I bought 2 of these to replace the Bridge I setup using Linksys WRT54G wireless routers with open source firmware. But setting two of these Powerline switches proved more difficult than I expected. Zyxel's tech support never returned my emails asking for help. Installing the software in Windows 7 was difficult and needed to manually copy 3 files inside the Utility folder from the CD to system32 folder (computer) to make it work. Now my setup is Cable Modem> Wireless router> Zyxel powerline router. If I put the Zyxel before the wireless router , I lose internet in the 2nd Zyxel.

I am giving four star because of Zyxel's refusal to reply to any of my emails. If I didn't get help from my Network engineer friend I would have returned them by now.

Very good value.Previously, I bought a pair of powerline adapters to connect the routers and one computer and found they are easy to install and connected at good speed. I bought the PLA470 for my home office where I can connect my computer, Internet telephone box, printer and network storage all together to share the powerline network. This product provides very good value to me.