Netgear Touts "All-Access Home" at CES

In a press conference in Las Vegas on Sunday, the Santa Clara, Calif.-based firm showcased three new products that it promises will free consumers from the clutter of wired networks, make connecting to devices easier, and do it all with bandwidth high enough to stream movies.

"Our customers in the homes or small offices, they can utilize the high-speed broadband internet... for any application from any corner of the office or the home without any interruption," explained Netgear founder and CEO, Patrick Lo.

Lo went on to introduce a new wireless router- dubbed the RangeMax Dual Band - which utilizes 8 new antennas to minimize interference with other household appliances and increase throughput. Legacy devices without wireless access can still pair with the wire-free networking via the new HD/Gaming Wireless-N Networking Kit, also introduced.

A mock living room scenario was set up, in which a High-Definition movie streamed over the wireless network into a modern plasma TV, which was connected to the wireless network. To make matters more interesting, the data was not streamed from a computer, but a new network storage drive, the ReadyNAS Duo Drive.

"Photo's, music, videos, and important files will be backed up and always available," Netgear's Vice-President Vivek Pathela explained of the ReadyNAS ."it's the easiest always ready and available multimedia storage, that allows for connecting to a variety of clients."

Netgear, one of the 2700 exhibitors to showcase new products at this years CES, will also be introducing 15 other new products later this week.

The new router and HD/Gaming network adapter will both be available later this month for $129.99 each, while the ReadyNAS storage solution is expected this quarter at $499.99.

See full coverage from International CES 2008