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Wireless LANs Dominate In Homes; Equipment Revenues To Surge

Local-area networks (LANs) in the home market are now dominated by wireless technologies, which have passed the timeworn Ethernet solution, according to a report on home networking released Tuesday by market research firm In-Stat.

The high tech market research firm predicted that equipment revenues from home networking will jump from just under $9 billion in 2004 to more than $21 billion in 2009. In-Stat said the home wireless market is now dominated by multi-band 54Mbps 802.11g as the number of installed home networks worldwide rocketed from 24 million in 2003 to 37 million in 2004.

However, not all home networking areas are booming, the report stated, noting that storage and streaming of multimedia files hasn’t taken off yet.

“There is growing interest among U.S. consumers to use home networks to connect their increasing library of digital entertainment audio and video files with their traditional entertainment equipment,” said In-Stat analyst Joyce Putscher in a statement. “As consumers become more comfortable and familiar with the idea of bridging their PCs with their traditional analog equipment, interest will pick up.”

The report observed that the home networking phenomenon is largely driven by the increasing prevalence of VoIP.