Belkin Releases Home Base for Storage and Printer Sharing

[Chris Gohlke]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.belkin.com/pressroom/releases/uploads/09_15_09_HomeBase.html' target='_blank'>http://www.belkin.com/pressroom/rel...9_HomeBase.html</a><br /><br /></div><p><em>"Belkin Home Base lets anyone within an existing wireless network print to a single, shared printer from anywhere in the home. Attach an external hard drive to one of Home Base's four USB ports to save and share music, pictures, and videos with your family. Home Base has wireless built in, so the wired port is an option if you do not want to go wirelessly. It will automatically back up each connected computer's files periodically to a connected external hard drive, so you don't have to worry about sudden data loss. With the automatic sharing feature, Home Base can automatically upload your new photos to a Flickr or Picasa account. With popular gaming consoles like PS3&trade; or Xbox 360&reg;, Home Base lets you wirelessly access media files stored on an attached hard drive."</em></p><p><img src="http://images.thoughtsmedia.com/resizer/thumbs/size/600/dht/auto/1253493093.usr10.jpg" style="border: 0;" /></p><p>Pretty neat, my Western Digital WorldBook recently died, leaving me without network file storage (luckily I've got a mutli-layered backup scheme and didn't lose anything).&nbsp; The above paragraph just mentions sharing storage and printers, but the bullet points seem to suggest that you can share any USB device, so I wonder if a scanner would work too.</p><p><em></em></p>

[The Yaz]

I have the earlier model from Belkin which they called a USB Network Hub. While it does the job as advertised (I have one inkjet, one B/W LaserPrinter, and two external Hard Drives attached and available to the four computers in my house) it has one annoying feature/limitation. When one computer is accessing one of the devices, no other computer can be using that device.

This makes using the external drives useless for streaming music. The printers can also be confusing as well. Each computer has to load up the Hub's shell, listing what devices are connected. If one computer is using a printer, another computer will be told it is in use and will send a request to the other computer, asking to release the printer.

In the end, I moved the hub to my den's closet where my desktop primarily uses easch of the devices. I purchased a Brother HL2170W to be the default printer for the other computers and seperate NAS to manage our family's music collection.

It's not a bad solution, but hopefully Belkin has added some type of buffer to this version to avoid these headaches ;)

Steve

[Reid Kistler]

Interesting device, at which seems a reasonably fair price (based upon previous shopping around for a wireless printer service - albeit some time ago....).

Would be concerned about the issues Steve raises.

Would also question usage with Scanner, as have had trouble in past when attempting to get one - or even the scanner portion of a multi-function device - to work through various connectivity options. Again, may be simply a case of not keeping up with the times: certainly our Brother MFC Laser works fine with any system connected to its local hub (although the MFC was specifically designed for network use).

CHRIS: "...my Western Digital WorldBook recently died...."

-> Am curious as to HOW OLD your WorldBook was. Still think of these Ext Drives as being fairly new on the market, and am thus surprised / disappointed to already be hearing about FAILURES!

[Chris Gohlke]

I've had it since late 2007. I reviewed it here - http://www.digitalhomethoughts.com/news/show/32043/western-digital-my-book-world-edition-1tb.html I gutted the unit and confirmed it was the drive itself that died.

[Reid Kistler]

I've had it since late 2007...... I gutted the unit and confirmed it was the drive itself that died.

Barely - or Not Even - 2 years old & already dead! :(

Doesn't speak much for reliability. Am now worried how long my Maxtor ext drive will hold out -"3 Year Warranty" or not!

Have always employed a multiple drive / media BU scheme, but that was a LOT easier when all of the Critical Files (mostly data...) would fit on a small set of 3.5" floppies!

[tregnier]

I think I have the best and least expensive solution. External hard drive plus Carbonite/Mozy.