D-Link at CES : Cloud-Friendly Routers and IP Cameras

We took some time to swing by D-Link's press room and got a look at all the nice networking gear announced via multiple press releases yesterday. In keeping up with the times, D-Link has come up with a very effective cloud strategy. The mydlink.com service forms the backbone of this strategy.

IP Cameras

Two cameras were on display. The first one was the D-Link DCS942L IP camera with enhanced day and night surveillance coming in at $149. Having a traditional industrial design, it captures video in VGA resolution at 30 fps. With a microSD card slot on the side, the video can also be recorded locally. It can be connected to the network through either the wired 100 Mbps port or the 802.11b/g/n wireless interface. Two way audio support is also provided.

Gallery: D-Link DCS-942L

D-Link has also come up with a PTZ (Pan-Tilt-Zoom) model (DCS5222L) capable of recording 720p  surveillance video at 30 fps in H.264 format. All the features of the DCS942L are retained, but the extra resolution and the PTZ feature bring up the price to $249.

Gallery: D-Link DCS-5222L

Both the IP cameras have Android and iOS apps which work through the mydlink.com account.

Routers and Access Points

D-Link released a number of routers and access points today. The All-in-One Mobile Companion (DIR505) is an interesting little gadget capable of a number of functions. In the router mode, the device plugs into a power outlet and a wired Ethernet cable from the modem is connected to the 100 Mbps wired port. A drive can be connected to the USB port and the DIR505 acts as a wireless router with the USB drive contents visible to all devices connected to that wireless network. In the repeater mode, the unit acts in conjunction with an already existing access point and repeats the signal. An attached USB drive will also have its content shared. In a similar configuration, the DIR505 can also be configured as a Wi-Fi Hot Spot with a NAT for its own network. To top it all, the device can also charge your smartphone. The unfortunate aspect is that the wireless output is only 802.11g compliant and the wired port is 100 Mbps.

Gallery: D-Link DIR-505

The DIR605L cloud router is a very basic router with four 100 Mbps ports and 802.11n support. The interesting aspect of this router is the mydlink.com service attached to the unit. With the help of an Android / iOS app, it is possible to have a very dumbed down presentation of the usual router configuration pages (which is probably welcomed by the average consumer). It also presents information related to the state of the network.

Gallery: D-Link DIR-605L

In addition to these two routers, we have two high end offerings. The DHP1565 is one of the first Hy-Fi devices I have seen. THe Hybrid Networking concept, pioneered by Atheros Qualcomm, integrates wired ethernet, powerline and Wi-Fi networking in a single router. The DHP1565 has four GbE ports, a 500 Mbps powerline connector (also the AC power input) and 802.11n support. There is also an explicit switch to make the unit act as either a router or an access point.

Gallery: D-Link DHP-1565

The HD Media Router 3000 is capable of simultaneous dual band operation to deliver a total of 900 Mbps (450 Mbps in each of the 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz bands) bandwidth. Four GbE ports are accompanies by a USB 3.0 port for attaching drives and a SD card slot.QoS is implemented in hardware with Ubicom technology. D-Link demonstrated the efficiency of the QoS engine in action by playing back YouTube videos in a highly congested network and compared it with the software QoS implemented on other routers. The difference was clearly visible, and I believe this type of QoS implementation will be the way to go forward for the next generation routers.

Gallery: D-Link DIR-857

Entertainment and Media Storage

Boxee's LiveTV dongle was on display. It appears that D-Link, Boxee and Hauppauge have worked together to get this accessory out.

Gallery: D-Link Boxee Box - Live TV Dongle

D-Link also indicated the possibility of product announcements related to the NAS and media streamer markets in the next few months.

 

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Mobile modems and routers

Modems which use mobile phone lines (GPRS, UMTS, HSPA, EVDO, WiMax, etc.), are known as cellular modems. Cellular modems can be embedded inside a laptop or appliance, or they can be external to it. External cellular modems are datacards and cellular routers. The datacard is a PC card or ExpressCard which slides into a PCMCIA/PC card/ExpressCard slot on a computer. The best known brand of cellular modem datacards is the AirCard made by Sierra Wireless.[citation needed] (Many people just refer to all makes and models as AirCards, when in fact this is a trademarked brand name.)[citation needed] Nowadays, there are USB cellular modems as well that use a USB port on the laptop instead of a PC card or ExpressCard slot. A cellular router may or may not have an external datacard (AirCard) that slides into it. Most cellular routers do allow such datacards or USB modems, except for the WAAV, Inc. CM3 mobile broadband cellular router. Cellular Routers may not be modems per se, but they contain modems or allow modems to be slid into them. The difference between a cellular router and a cellular modem is that a cellular router normally allows multiple people to connect to it (since it can route, or support multipoint to multipoint connections), while the modem is made for one connection.

Most of the GSM cellular modems come with an integrated SIM cardholder (i.e., Huawei E220, Sierra 881, etc.) The CDMA (EVDO) versions do not use SIM cards, but use Electronic Serial Number (ESN) instead.

The cost of using a cellular modem varies from country to country. Some carriers implement flat rate plans for unlimited data transfers. Some have caps (or maximum limits) on the amount of data that can be transferred per month. Other countries have plans that charge a fixed rate per data transferred—per megabyte or even kilobyte of data downloaded; this tends to add up quickly in today's content-filled world, which is why many people are pushing for flat data rates.

The faster data rates of the newest cellular modem technologies (UMTS, HSPA, EVDO, WiMax) are also considered to be broadband cellular modems and compete with other broadband modems below.

Mobile modems and routers

Modems which use mobile phone lines (GPRS, UMTS, HSPA, EVDO, WiMax, etc.), are known as cellular modems. Cellular modems can be embedded inside a laptop or appliance, or they can be external to it. External cellular modems are datacards and cellular routers. The datacard is a PC card or ExpressCard which slides into a PCMCIA/PC card/ExpressCard slot on a computer. The best known brand of cellular modem datacards is the AirCard made by Sierra Wireless.[citation needed] (Many people just refer to all makes and models as AirCards, when in fact this is a trademarked brand name.)[citation needed] Nowadays, there are USB cellular modems as well that use a USB port on the laptop instead of a PC card or ExpressCard slot. A cellular router may or may not have an external datacard (AirCard) that slides into it. Most cellular routers do allow such datacards or USB modems, except for the WAAV, Inc. CM3 mobile broadband cellular router. Cellular Routers may not be modems per se, but they contain modems or allow modems to be slid into them. The difference between a cellular router and a cellular modem is that a cellular router normally allows multiple people to connect to it (since it can route, or support multipoint to multipoint connections), while the modem is made for one connection.

Most of the GSM cellular modems come with an integrated SIM cardholder (i.e., Huawei E220, Sierra 881, etc.) The CDMA (EVDO) versions do not use SIM cards, but use Electronic Serial Number (ESN) instead.

The cost of using a cellular modem varies from country to country. Some carriers implement flat rate plans for unlimited data transfers. Some have caps (or maximum limits) on the amount of data that can be transferred per month. Other countries have plans that charge a fixed rate per data transferred—per megabyte or even kilobyte of data downloaded; this tends to add up quickly in today's content-filled world, which is why many people are pushing for flat data rates.

The faster data rates of the newest cellular modem technologies (UMTS, HSPA, EVDO, WiMax) are also considered to be broadband cellular modems and compete with other broadband modems below.