Unified communication

G.hn is a specification for existing-wire home networking. It is acomplementary counterpart to Wi-Fi.[citation needed] G.hn targets gigabit per second data rates[4] and operation over three types of legacy home wires: telephone wiring, coaxial cables and power lines. A single G.hn semiconductor device is able to network over any of the supported home wire types. Some benefits of a multi-wire standard are lower equipment development costs and lower deployment costs for service providers (by allowing customer self-install).

The majority of devices in which G.hn may become embedded (such as televisions, set-top boxes, residential gateways, personal computers or network-attached storage devices) will be AC-powered, so configurations that have at least one power line networking interface are likely to become the most common. This [clarification needed] will also facilitate integration with home control and demand side management applications for AC-powered appliances.

The ITU-T extended the technology [clarification needed] with multiple input, multiple output (MIMO) technology to increase data rates and signaling distance. [1] The work on MIMO for G.hn at ITU-T is under the G.9963 standard.

By developing dual mode devices [clarification needed], G.hn proponents believe[opinion] it can provide an evolution path from other wired home networking technologies such as Multimedia over Coax Alliance (MoCA), HomePNA 3.1 over coax and phone wires (already an ITU standard G.9954), and HomePlug AV, Universal Powerline Association (UPA) and HD-PLC over powerline. In February 2009 the key promoters[who?] of two of these interfaces united behind the latest version of the standard.