Home PNA "Phoneline Networking" Round Up

Conclusion
Looking quickly at the numbers, there is one card that is the fastest and one that is the slowest. The Intel AnyPoint came out on top in all three sections, while the D-Link DHN-520 came in third every time. However, the Intel's largest margin over the D-Link is only 0.39 seconds over a 95 second data transfer. Percentage-wise, that's less than one half of one percent. 0.41% to be more accurate. The smallest margin Intel has over the competition is a dead tie with the PA301 in the Direct Connection test. So, at best, the Intel cards are 0.41% faster than the other cards in the round-up. The margin of error in these tests is almost certainly higher than 0.41%, so we may say that the cards are all virtually the same speed. That isn't earth-shattering news considering that all the cards are using the same Broadcom chipset.

The meat of the difference between these products lies in two factors not shown by the tests:

1) Software
2) Price.

The Intel cards have the highest price tag, at $69.00 each. The Netgear are the lowest at about $48.82 each. On the software side, the Intel cards have by far the best Internet sharing software.

In the end, it comes down to your intended use of the products. If you plan to use the cards to connect computers to each other, but not to the Internet, the Netgear cards will be perfect, if they work as well as they did in our lab. They have a very simple driver setup, and an intuitive drive and printer sharing interface. If, however, you want to use your HomePNA network to share your Internet connection you will probably want to spend the extra $44.00 and go with the Intel. The setup was easy, the interface intuitive, and the Internet sharing completely seamless. A wise man once said, "The most expensive is the cheapest in the long run". When it comes to reducing your overall frustration level, we'd tend to agree :)