NETGEAR XE102 Wall-Plugged Ethernet Bridge

Other products by Netgear

Product Details

• Product Dimensions: 4 x 3 x 2 inches ; 7 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B0002IHP58
• Item model number: XE102US
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (82 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank

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  Electronics > Computers & Accessories > Networking Products > Powerline Network Adapters

• Date first available at Amazon.com: September 21, 2007

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

The NETGEAR XE102 Wall-Plugged Ethernet Bridge offers: An easy way to extend a network connection using just your power lines 14 Mbps throughput True plug and play simplicity

The NETGEAR XE102 Wall-Plugged Ethernet Bridge lets you easily extend a network using just the existing electric lines of your home, eliminating the need to run unsightly Ethernet wires all over your house or apartment.

Installation is as simple as plugging the device in and connecting it to the network. View larger.

True Plug and Play Installation
To extend a network using the electric lines in your home, you need two XE102 units. Simply plug one of them into a wall outlet and connect it to your router with an Ethernet cord. Plug the second one into any wall outlet that is electrically connected to the first and you have an instant Ethernet port to plug a computer, gaming console, or other networkable device with an RJ-45 Ethernet plug. You can create as many network connections as you need by connecting more XE102 units. The device has easy-to-read icon LEDs for status information at a glance.

The XE102 has a 10BASE-T Ethernet jack and supports the 10 Mbps HomePlug 1.0 standard. It uses Forward Error Correction (FEC) and Automatic channel adaptation to ensure the integrity of the data. In order to enable encryption, you need a computer with Windows XP, 2000, ME or 98.

The NETGEAR XE102 Wall-Plugged Ethernet Bridge is backed by a 3-year warranty.

What's in the Box
XE102 Wall-Plugged Ethernet Bridge, installation guide, Ethernet cable, resource CD, and warranty/support information card.

Product Description

For a truly simple way to bring the Internet to any room in your home, look no further than NETGEAR's Wall-Plugged Ethernet Bridge. It plugs into an electrical outlet and uses your existing electrical wiring to give your entire household access to your Cable/DSL connection. With no expensive new wiring or cabling to install, your family can surf the Web, participate in online gaming, send and receive e-mail, and share files and printers, all from different rooms at the same time. Uncomplicated and very quick to install, it plugs right into a wall outlet, reducing clutter and saving valuable desk space. Designed for ease of use, it has new, easy-to-read icon LEDs, and protects your network communications from eavesdroppers and hackers, while not increasing your electricity bill.

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

52 of 52 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Works for me on different circuits, September 28, 2004

By	R. Blauvelt (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I tested these between the two units in a duplex apartment building. Each apartment has its own electrical meter and main panel, although they share the same 240Volt service from the street. Result: Works great! The speeds varied slightly depending on the outlets into which these were plugged, but were always much faster than my 3 Mb/s cable modem connection, and were also consistently faster than 802.11b wireless. Supposedly, the connection quality is not limited by distance, and the signal travels just fine across circuit breakers, fuses, and even between the two 120V legs of a 240V service connection, as I confirmed. In a big building, or one with many obstructions, wireless is a hit-or-miss solution, whereas this seems to be rock-solid.

29 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good for mixed environments and getting broadband out of the basement, October 24, 2005

By	J. F. Herlocker Jr. - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Overall I am very happy with the Netgear XE102. I have two Macs (running OS X 10.2 and 10.3) and an old laptop running Win95. The Macs are in my second floor home office, the laptop is in the family room, the cable modem and router are in the basement. (The cable company offered "free installation" of broadband service; this turned out to mean "we'll hook up a cable modem at the point where our cable enters your house, and if that turns out to be the basement and you happen to not have your computer there, well, you can schedule further installation for an additional charge.") The Macs and a network printer are attached to a hub which connects to the XE102 in the office.

With three XE102 units (basement, office, family room) I have all my PCs hooked up to the Internet and functional. No additional configuration was needed, although I could have used VirtualPC on one of my Macs to set up security if I wanted to (we live in a standalone house, so no one else taps into our electrical system; if we lived in an apartment, I would definitely have activated the security setup, which involves putting all three units on the same password). Speeds are consistently over 10Mbps (faster than the cable modem) and, once the units were set up, we have needed no additional fussing with them. The Macs can see the Windows laptop and vice versa, and file transfers work fine (well, as well as file transfers work in a Mac/Windows environment). The laptop can even print to the network printer upstairs.

Note of caution: when first plugging in the XE102s, be patient. It took at least half an hour before the first two units found each other. The third unit also did not jump into the network immediately (and pulling it out of the wall socket and plugging it in repeatedly only slowed down the process). After all three found each other, however, I could take any one, disconnect it from the wall, plug it in at another spot (my wife likes to take the laptop onto our back deck, which has an outdoor power plug), and have immediate connectivity, anywhere in the house.

The units get a little warm, but not alarmingly so. The three indicator lights are excellent for indicating status, so long as you do not want to know anything more than, "Yes, it's working."

I recommend the XE102 for anyone who wants to connect network points within the house without running cables or fussing with WLANs, and certainly for anyone trying to connect devices in a mixed environment.

FOOTNOTE: The XE102 units also work well with XE103 and XE104 85mbps units. You can have a mixed network of the 11mbps and 85mbps units, and speeds from point-to-point will be the speed of the slower unit, but with no impact on the speeds between two fast units.

30 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Painless Networking, February 23, 2005

By	Richard Drdul (Vancouver, BC) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I us three XE102's to network a primary computer to a second computer downstairs and to a media server (Squeezebox) in the living room. Installation and setup of all three took 10 minutes, and they work flawlessly.

The Netgear software utility to set the passwords is easy to use, and is also useful in verifying the transmission rates (my XE102's vary between 12.8 and 14.0 Mbps depending on what other devices in the house are drawing power).

I was surprised at how well the XE102's work, given that the circuit which the main computer's XE102 is plugged into has a ton of computer equipment plugged into it via a big Tripplite power conditioner/surge protector. Ditto for the XE102 in the living room, which is plugged into the same circuit that all my A/V equipment is plugged into.

The bottom line is that I am one very happy guy, as the XE102's have enabled me to avoid the cost/hassle of running Cat5 cable, as well as the aggravation of wireless networking (which wasn't working very well for the living room connection prior to getting the XE102's).