Wireless networking has made its way in to most homes, and provides a quick and easy way to get the majority of your devices connected to the network / Internet. While the throughput of Wi-Fi is just fine for many applications, there are just some things that are better handled by a hard wired connection. High definition multimedia is a prime candidate for a hard wired connection, especially if multiple streams are present simultaneously, as it offers much higher throughput to greatly reduce the potential for image degradation, dropped frames, or other issues that may occur with a wireless connection.

The main problem with getting all of your devices online via a hard wired connection is that most homes, especially those more than just a few years old, do not have wiring run to each room to provide a typical RJ45 network port. What most homes do have though, is coaxial wiring for cable television. There are "ethernet over coax adapters" that can connect to your existing network and transmit data over your home's coaxial cable wiring to another adapter that will then convert it back for use by your more remotely located networked devices. In the case of the item to be reviewed, the Actiontec WCB3000NK01, it will not only provide a pair of RJ45 wired connections at the other end of your coaxial cable run, but it also provides a dual band (2.4GHz and 5GHZ) wireless extender.