Their aim was to formulate a single, unified phoneline networking technology that could be brought to market quickly, providing interoperable home networking products. There are now 33 participant members and over 50 adopter members. With this technology, computers, peripherals and other information devices would be able to communicate to each other and the Internet using standard telephone wiring simultaneously allowing normal telephone service. By December 1998 products displaying the HomePNA logo became available. HomePNA adopted Tut Systems technology to work with the existing phoneline network within today's homes.
Many network topologies require that each node be wired to a central hub.
The home phoneline topology is usually a random connection of nodes. Telephone, faxes and modems can be connected and disconnected from the phoneline changing the topology. With each of these nodes, there are several connections that are not used and therefore are not properly terminated. This results in impedance mismatches and signal echoes that can lead to multi-path signals. Signal noise Random and varying levels of noise can be induced into the phoneline from appliances, heaters, air conditioners, consumer appliances and even telephones.