MIMO for Inhome Power Line Communications

Inhome Power Line Communications (PLC) enables new and highly convenient networking functions without any additional cables to mains-powered devices. Throughput measurements have shown that current PLC technology does not provide sufficient bandwidth for all typical inhome applications in a reliable way. This paper clarifies if Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) methods, being well-known from the wireless world, can significantly increase the PLC channel throughput and the link reliability. After proving the theoretical capacity increase on measured PLC channels, different MIMO schemes are compared regarding their suitability for the PLC channel.