My Ideal Home Network

I bought another gadget, impulsively, again. Here comes my excuse explanation: I had a hard disk which crashed on me a couple months ago, and my personal photos and past Illustrator works with it. I attempted to send it for data retrieve, and a walk in Sim Lim Square told me that it’s going to be expensive. I ended up throwing that hard disk into the trash.

Now, with all my work, photos and music stored in my MacBook Pro, I am very worried that it might crash one day too. And so I purchased this guy (320GB model) at FitNUS Bazaar at $199 with using it for backups in mind. However, I think its usage may be expanded and therefore I decided to set up my ideal home network with this as the starting piece:

Currently, I have a total of 3 working computers at home; one MacBook Pro and two PCs. Sharing movies/music between computers can be quite an hassle, especially when you need to switch on a PC just to get some files out. Having a central storage can solve a lot of problem; all computers will just dump their files in there and they’d be accessible from any computer! So central storage system, check.

Wired network is always the most reliable and fastest but I can’t afford to lay such cables across my living room. So what I need is either a wireless router with a USB2 port like the latest Airport Extreme; or this Network Storage Link. Hard disk to router interface, check.

And what is a wireless home network which is supported by a lousy wireless router? Hopefully, the 802.11n protocol becomes a wireless standard by the time I have saved enough money to upgrade. Then I’d buy a new router to ensure a smooth media streaming experience for all three computers. Great wireless router for video/music streaming, check.

Most probably, I’d need to do some remodeling at the living room area to accommodate all these new devices. If each of them has a power brick, it sure is going to be an ugly sight. So lastly, esthetic considerations, check.

Looks like I’ve a lot of savings to be done. Heh…