Just a couple of things that could help others choose the right connections for their projects;

Which Wifi & Wired boards have you used/plan to use? Links? And why Wired Ethernet rather than USB?

Because of the distance ,i have them in a few rooms and i have network cable already there ,so to run to USB would be to hard plus problem with the length,with wired you dont have that problem.

ONLY using a WIFI BOARD ,but this has outputs called PHY for network RJ45.

I could use WIRED NETWORK to ttl adapter,but having both is much better and there are ways to use both. i got the WIFI board in and RJ45 JACK IN ,only now waiting on a small adapter board for RJ45 connector wifi board with phy

most WIFI boards dont have PHY (ETHERNET) I/O, then a speciail isolated transfomer is needed

USB is mostly for short runs,with WIRED NETWORK its long runs

The downside to going over network (wired or wifi) is the network integrity. If the network goes down for any reason you are without connection where as with USB you are always connected at the expense of having to have the control PC very much local to the EZB.

I completely agree with you on the ease of use with network points around a house.

Problem is that USB you need to buy a seperate computer for each board almost, every thing in my house in every room has network,a few have 1GIG LAN some have 10/100

I found i needed 1 GIG LAN for video server on my 3 large screen tv's with media server

I tried with 10/100 and video would miss or mess up.you need a special cable and GIG SWITCH

On other designs i use USB to TTL adapter board,do not like bluetooth at all,unless a certain robot i am making uses a special controller with bluetooth.

Bluetooth is great but wifi would definately solve a problem with "distance". @robotmaker I have saved most of your threads as they are very informative Rich (and others)are included in my saved threads

@robotmaker, For your application wired ethernet is probably more suited however thinking of other project ideas, and including your tanks and cages, you could easily use USB to connect 5 EZBs to one PC.

USB2 has a maximum length of 5M for Hi-Speed (480Mbps). If you wanted multiple EZB controlled kitchen appliances, USB could be used.

Most homes do not have wired ethernet installed in every room, for others (and that's what I'm getting at here) wired ethernet may not be the best option.

I'm not sure why you would need gigabit ethernet for media streaming, sure it helps if there are other processes going on in the background or multiple streams at the same time but otherwise 10/100 is fine - at least in my experience I had no problems with 10/100 and streaming HD movies while someone else listened to music or watched another movie, the only reason I upgraded my switches was because my internet was boosted to 120mbps and I wanted to get the most out of it. HD movies can be streamed over 54Mbps wifi without issues (although it's not recommended as if the speed drops you end up buffering). As for special cables, Cat5E has been the standard for years now which supports gigabit ethernet, I don't even know where you could buy normal Cat5 cable these days and as Cat5e is cheap there is no point to Cat5 now. Check every CAT5 cable you have and, unless they are very old, I'm sure you will see CAT5E or CAT6 written on them. But that's another story/issue entirely.

Bluetooth can be OK but is limited. Range is the main issue there. If the EZB came in a bluetooth and wifi variety I would pick wifi every time. But it doesn't and bluetooth covers where I need it to.

Wifi has it's problems but they are few. Range could be an issue if you have a very large area you wish to cover, but then you could simply extend it. The only other issue is wifi signals dropping. This is assuming the router is set up correctly otherwise there are a whole host of other issues to deal with but those are router issues not wifi issues.

For mobile applications with no onboard control computer the option of USB or Wired ethernet just aren't there.

But what about RF? That's one that's seldom mentioned. Have you looked in to that? Has anyone?

It's all food for thought and hopefully information for people to consider. If you, or anyone else can add to any of it feel free.

its fairly easy to wire homes for wired LAN,I did my very easy,may be in your area may be harder ON my streamming i found sometimes it loses signal and ethernet is fine CAT5 not really for 1 GIG lan where cat6 is,when i buy it ,it says its for 1GIG line SO when i added GIG lan i have no problems at all.my brother installs professional systems mostly TV and media streamers for the rich ,and he only uses CAT6 for same reason REASON this idea came up is not for my project ,but others wanted WIFI instead of bluetooth and for extra $9 in parts can easy add RJ45

ON ADDING USB its a lot harder to hide the wire,thats another big reason ,unless you have your EZB's connected close together aslo i have 54mbps on my WIFI and still does more of the problem as 10/100 ,my cable internet is 300 mbps and at 10/100 is loses signal sometimes or go very slowly,with 1 gig lan is really good i am thinking in UNITED KINGDOM may be its ok, i think it needs about 150mbps to have no problems at all

this idea may not be for everyone's application,but i putting it up there to so they can use it or not

I See WIFI posts come up alot on EZB forum

There are good points and bad points on each type of connection.bluetooth,wifi,lan and usb