Cisco-Linksys HPN200 HomeLink Phoneline 10M Network Card

By allocating certain frequencies for certain types of data transfer, the Linksys HomeLink Phoneline 10M network card allows your phone line to carry computer data simultaneously with your voice. You can talk on the telephone, download files from the Internet, and share data between PCs--all at the same time if you are using a cable or DSL modem. Every standard telephone jack in the home is capable of hosting a PC, allowing you to transform your telephone wiring into an expandable network. A telephone cable is included with the HomeLink Phoneline 10M network card.

To answer the reviewers other comment, an easy way to hook PC's and Printers by HPNA phoneline networking to a Cable/DSL connection is to use the Linksys HomePNA Cable/DSL router announced a month ago. Should be shipping in the late Feb timeframe. CHeck with Linksys on it... this is different than the bridge for sale in Amazon... the bridge makes you have to have a real IP address for each PC. The upcoming Router will allow you to share the one IP address you get from your cable/DSL company with all the stuff in the house. That's the deal you probably want.


Love Linksys   March 14, 2001
Patrick Carroll (Atlanta, GA USA)
4 out of 4 found this review helpful

I have a DSL modem, which I've been using for a while. I have another computer in another part of my house which, until recently, was used to access AOL via a dialup line.

I installed this phoneline network card on that computer, put PPPOE on it, modified the AOL access to go through a LAN, and bought the Linksys HomeLink Broadband Network Bridge. I connected the AOL computer to it via the this phoneline network card.

Now this computer access the internet via the DSL modem. It worked first time. No muss, no fuss. AOL access is now completely reliable, and it flies!

I was very impressed with how easy it was to make this work. I have some understanding of networking, but not a lot. If I can make this work, any literate person can.


Secure alternative to wireless   January 7, 2004
Bill (Houston, TX USA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful

Easy install, very reliable. Most of the wireless networks I've encountered are absolutely insecure. They don't have to be, but the users stop short of implementing encryption and MAC address filtering. For those people, this is a safer alternative. Almost as convenient as wireless but without the risk. Phoneline networking doesn't suffer from interference of walls, ceilings, wiring, etc. either. I've used both wireless and phoneline. If I can't have Cat-5 cabling, give me a phoneline network. You can use these cards with the Linksys HPNA router, which serves the HPNA network as well as conventional 10/100 Ethernet concurrently.


Haven't bought it yet, but I have done some research.   October 16, 2000
Geoffrey Henggeler (West Lafayette, IN United States)
7 out of 10 found this review helpful

This product looks pretty useful to me. As far as sharing a broadband or xDSL connection I think that you would need to purchase the Linksys HomeLink Broadband Network Bridge (HPES03). That should get the job done. However, there are several problems that I have heard or read about. First, regular phone lines are fairly susceptible to static interference. If your house has a lot of phone wiring, or if the wiring is fairly old, or if the lines have relatively heavy interference the homelink network will not work. Also, I have heard that the included internet sharing software is not very reliable and that the software developer does not support the software. The multitudes of Linksys products that work with this line (the Homelink networking line) have a lot of potential, though, and I would use this system in my house if I knew that it would work. My advice would be to have your local phone service provider stop by your house and examine the phone wiring. They should be able to tell you (for free) the amount of phone wiring in your house and how clear the connections are. Then I would ask around on the internet and maybe even the local home electronics store to see if the phone wiring in your house would be good enough to use the Homelink system. Even then, I'd definitely keep the receipts of the stuff you purchase in case you can't get the network running due to unacceptable phone line connections. I guess if your phone lines won't work for networking you can always go with ethernet category 5 cabling. But if you can satisfy your needs using regular phone line I'd stick with that. Hope this helps.