Extending the PC in the Home

Many technologies introduced into the home have become a part of everyday life. Today, many factors, such as the availability of broadband access, the growth of home networks, and the popularity of devices such as Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) and cell phones are combining to reshape the home use of electronics. As all the devices in the home become fully connected, we move towards the next step in its evolution, the e-Home. The e-Home presents significant new benefits to consumers and business opportunities for home technology providers. One such opportunity is the delivery of network-based services and applications to the consumer. However, there are challenging technological barriers to overcome before the e-Home can meet its full potential. In today’s home, there are various types of interconnections between computing, control, communication, and entertainment devices. These incompatible technologies and communications protocols result in such devices existing on disparate islands of connectivity. Complicating this issue is the explosion in the number of mobile, wireless devices that should be full participants in the virtual home network. Much work needs to be done to organize and bridge these communications gaps into a single, virtual home network. The new extended PC will be a coordinator of activity in the e-Home, bridging the various home networks and providing the central computing and communication engine for new kinds of applications that take advantage of the connected nature of home devices. This paper presents an overall vision and architectural framework for the connected home of the future. It describes how the extended PC plays a vital role in this evolution, identifies the necessary infrastructure to move to a single virtual network, and recommends a standard, open framework to enable delivery of managed services into the home. INTRODUCTION In the early part of the twentieth century, novel services such as electricity and telephones began to find their way into homes. Early adopters got a few electric lights, some outlets, and a phone with a crank hung on a wall. By the 1920s, recorded sounds made their way into the home on Edison wax cylinders, and moving pictures were widely available in theaters. Radio broadcasts, the first wholesale delivery of media into the home, also began in the 1920s. Radio networks featuring live music, soap operas, and radio theater sprang up in the 1930s, and by the late 1940s, television brought the movie theater into the home. Both radio and television created opportunities for new and different forms of entertainment, and over the decades, these technologies expanded their presence in the home. Fast forward to the beginning of the twenty-first century. Electricity is now delivered ubiquitously throughout the home. The telephone is present in every room, enabled by pre-wired jacks and wireless phones. The CD has replaced the Edison recording cylinder, and radios are now utilitarian devices that have long since lost their venerated place as the center of home entertainment, at least in Western society. The television has become the center of family entertainment, and computers have entered the home as multi-purpose tools used for e-mail, family finance, gaming, and Web browsing. There are also many portable devices scattered throughout the home, such as wireless phones, hand-held gaming systems, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), cell phones, MP3 players, CD players, and various remote controls. Despite the continuous advancements in technology, most devices in the home today are organized into isolated islands of connectivity. Because of this communication gap, significant potential value to the consumer lies dormant. By extending the PC’s reach in the home and bridging this connectivity gap, the extended PC will become a catalyst, moving home technology to the next Intel Technology Journal Q2, 2001 Extending the PC in the Home 2 level, reaching another milestone in the evolution of home technology.