Interested in hooking up all my smart AV stuff to the web (TV/amp) but don’t want to have to have loads of separate powerline systems plugged in behind it. Is there a way to split the signal at that end so that it’s an either/or?

There’s never likely to be any demand from 2 channels as I’ll either be demanding input from one or the other so I’d like something that can feed to whichever device is demanding info at the time.

Hope that makes sense to you as I’m not sure it does to me.

Cheers

Gary

Either get a 4 port power line, or a network switch.

Edit – such as http://www.dabs.com/products/tp-link-5-port-10-100-mini-desk-switch-77SB.html?src=3

Does it have to be an either/or, Why not both?

There are powerline adaptors with two or eben three ethernet sockets built in, and some with WiFi. (other makes.models are available)

Or, if you already have a one socket adaptor, you could get a simple 4 or 5 port switch

Or, if you have an old ADSL router that can also be configured to sit on the end of your powerline adaptor and work as a switch.

Damn, beaten to it 🙂

A switch or hub sounds like your answer, a 4 port device should do. One cable from your broadband router to the hub then a cable from the hub to each device. Easy.

Thanks for the suggestions – I’ll look into them but if I’m honest I didn’t really want anything that complicated (or expensive).

I was hoping to be able to get away with a simple splitter block rather than something powered that will need to be (semi) permanently on and a bit tricky to set up (for a technical idiot like myself).

Sorry – it does need to be powered, you can’t share network ports.

You can share network ports, after a fashion, so long as you don’t need Gigabit speeds. 10/100 Ethernet only uses four wires in the 8-wire cable, so with a bit of hackery it’s possible to shove a second connection down the other four wires, then a similar hack at the other end to separate them out again.

However, for that to work it’d need to be a passive connection between the two ends, so running it over something like Homeplugs will be a non-starter. If you’re only ever going to use one device at once and you’re after a ghetto solution then the only thing I can think is to put the Homeplug somewhere accessible and unplug / plug in whichever cable you require at the time.

But TBH, you had the answer in the first two posts. Either a multi-port Homeplug or a four-port switch (or ‘number of devices’ + 1 really). £6 on jimdubleyou’s link, and from a technical standpoint it shouldn’t need any configuration at all beyond plugging it all in. If anything, it’ll be cheaper and considerably simpler than any cable-splitting tomfoolery.

Ok thanks on that recommendation I’ll give it a go.

Cheers all. 😀

Multiport homeplug here for telly, sky, xbox and media player. Works a treat.