Cool Things to Do With Your Home Network

Cool Things to Do With Your Home Network
“Control your own internal network.”
by Jack Dunning

Considering the massive size of the Internet and new Internet-based endeavors such as Google Apps and Windows Live, it's easy to start thinking that in the future all we will need for all of our computing needs is Internet access. The primary purpose of our home network has been a way to get onto the Web. It's commonly predicted that the next generation of computers will be stripped down, requiring only a network card—probably Wi-Fi—to hook up to the Internet.

While the Internet is important, it is only one piece of the computing puzzle. People will never totally abandon their computer programs, flocking only to outside sources for all of their computing needs. Whether it is computer-based programs, locally stored backup or a home media center, many people will want control of their home systems using the Internet for only a few Web applications that suit them—if any. For those people, their internal network will be their home system—and all parts of that system will work together.

Although Internet access has become essential in today's computing environment, it will not negate the importance of the individual computer or the growing relevancy of home networks. In the next few years, the home network will become increasingly important to our computing. We are starting to see personal networks come together in an ad hoc fashion as people realize how they can connect the equipment inside the home for better use. The devices making it all possible are now available and, as time goes on, they will drop in price. Rather than merely considering the type and price of a new computer (or printer, external hard drive, webcam, etc.), we will need to ask how each piece of equipment will fit into our total home system—this includes every component in the house.

Pieces to Add to Your the Home Network

It takes only one piece of equipment, a router, to set up a home network, but to see the future of the home systems, we need to look at many of the possible components and how they will affect our computing. The reason we wire our equipment together is because we want our computers and peripherals to be more than isolated machines. We want to create a synergistic system in which the Internet is merely a tool for connecting with the outside world.

Today, the primary motivation for building a network is usually sharing an Internet connection with more than one computer—or possibly sharing a printer. The building of a home network was not the object; rather, feeding the e-mail and the Web to multiple machines is enough of a reason to invest in a router.

The Network Router

Once a router is installed, the network is brought to life. The network router is the focal point for most networks not because it splits access to the Internet, but because it can act as a hub for all other network activity. Prior to using routers to share the Internet, we needed network hubs and/or switches to connect our internal computers. Until the Internet came along, in most cases, it just wasn't worth the effort to connect the machines. (We may have wanted to share a printer, but we could always take a copy of a file to the machine with the printer.) The router installation gave us a network without even trying.

Routers are multi-purpose in that they will act as an Internet access point as well as provide the ports for computers to connect together. We soon started seeing the other household computers appear in our directory windows. Why not just use the network created by the router to move files around and share printers? The router isn't merely a device on your network, it creates the network. (For more information on routers and selecting one for your home network, see the companion article "Setting up the Network of the Future" in this issue.)

The Printer/Scanner

Probably the first reason for wanting a network in the home was to share a printer. This was well before the Internet became popular. Printing was often an ordeal because printers were not built to be shared—no network interface was built into the printer. Usually the printer would be attached to one of the computers. If a person needed to print something from a different computer, he or she would put their work on a diskette and move to the computer with the printer attached. Special devices called print servers were needed to attach a printer to a network.

Today it is common to put a printer on a network for all to use. Printers have at least a USB connection built-in, while many of them offer Ethernet network connectors, or Wi-Fi. If you put a network drive into your home network, it may have a USB port that can support a printer. If you're looking at making the most of your home network, you should make sure that any printer has more than just a USB port for hookup. Network connections, both Wi-Fi and direct, will give you maximum flexibility. For older printers, you can get a device called a network print server for about $50, which will connect any standard printer to your network.

The Network Drive

The device most likely to make you start viewing your home network as a system is a network hard drive. A network hard drive is a hard disk storage system that is specifically designed to be used on a network. The computer-independent network drive allows users to share and back up files and data. (For more information on network drives, see the "Network Hard Drives for Your Home" article.) While most computers have their own dedicated hard drive, the network drive becomes a community device. It can act as file-backup storage while holding libraries of music and videos.

Rather than files being spread between a multitude of drives on various computers, a central network drive helps make the home network the nerve center of all computing. There is no need to depend upon the cloud of the Internet when you can build your own mini-cloud at home offering backup, applications and library sharing. Who needs Google Apps or Windows Live? Many of the network drives have features that allow remote access over the Internet, as well as USB ports for network printers. The network hard drive in its various forms will become the center of activity for the home network.

Home Entertainment Media Center

The Digital Video Recorder (DVR) has become the center of entertainment for people with cable or satellite television services. The DVR is essentially a hard drive with software that will record and replay television shows and movies. Its place has been as a link between the service and the television. It is standard for cable and satellite companies to offer DVRs as part of a package. Generally, there is an extra fee for a service such as TiVo, which provides the programming information.

As the sources for entertainment expand, especially through the Internet, there is more demand for breaking away from the bonds of the cable and satellite companies. People want to add DVRs to their home networks, feeding entertainment, including music and video, to any television or computer in their house.

The growth of the DVR home media center will be one of the primary forces bringing about a more mature home network. People take nothing more seriously than their entertainment.

Voice Over IP Telephone Service

As the quality of Voice over IP (VoIP) improves, the low cost and network convenience of VoIP telephone service will become an integral part of the home network. Rather than tying up a computer with the VoIP devices, they will plug directly into the home network.

Home Security (Webcams)

There are currently DVRs on the market designed for security. They connect webcams to the network while recording video activity. Since the network is Internet accessible, it's possible to monitor on video the activity at home while on vacation.

Digital Picture Frames

Digital picture frames may seem like a trivial application for a home network, but for many people it is the best possible way to view and place thousands of digital photos around the house. Many of the frames support Wi-Fi access, making them ideal for sharing from a central network hard drive. Once the price of OLED screens comes down, digital picture frames will be just one more reason to pay attention to our home network.

Many More Network Devices to Come

The network devices that I've mentioned only scratch the surface of what will be possible in the future. There are already many people who are making excellent and unique uses of their home networks, although most of them had to fit the pieces together themselves. If you or anyone you know has dabbled in any of these or other network devices for home use, we would like to hear about it. I invite you to leave a short comment or send a description to . We would like to share your experiences with our readers.