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I am trying to make Wake-on-LAN for my home server, so far connected only by Wifi, Wake-on-Wifi seems to be extremely tricky, and it's unfortunately quite far from router and I am reluctant to start laying ethernet cables everywhere in a rented house. So I came across to powerline ethernet, that is LAN through house mains, using adapter like: TL-PA9020P AV2000 Gigabit Passthrough Powerline Starter Kit.

Question is, would Wake-on-LAN work through them?

UPDATE

My main concern is that what keeps this adapter powered? All they always on? What activates them? What concerns me, is comments like here, on Netgear Powerline Adapters FAQ:

Q: Why my Ethernet printer/Nas is not waking up when connected to my powerline?

A: The Powerline adapter can only be awoken by a device that is connected to its Ethernet port, not via the power outlet. So, if the Powerline adapter is asleep, it can't pass data to the printer (or NAS), only FROM the printer..

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  • I've just ordered TL-PA8010P KIT. I am going to check it for myself and I'll share!
    – Espinosa
    Commented Apr 10, 2019 at 23:20
  • The firmware can do all that, but if it works with a specific device depends on how the manufacturer configured it. With the right tools you can change the configuration, but normally these tools are not freely available. So you can just buy and test with specific adapters.
    – Werner Henze
    Commented May 13, 2020 at 20:38

3 Answers 3

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So I bought the powerline adapters, TL-PA8010P to be precise, and after some testing I can confirm that Wake-on-LAN works flawlessly over powerlines and that the adapters react anytime, even after prolonged times of inactivity with PC switched completely off. Even when the control light changes to red, like not connected at all, it still reacts and can wake the PC. I didn't hate to set up anything special, like disabling power-saving mode; just pair them and it all worked out of the box.

I also noticed then with Wake-on-LAN allowed both in BIOS and Network Manager settings, when I switch the PC off, the network card is still visibly powered, signalling light blinking as if some traffic is still going on.

BTW, to wake up I use Android app Wake On Lan by Mike Webb.

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I can say from personal experience that WoL over powerline networking works. There is no reason it shouldnt, as the physical transport layer is abstracted from the entire process.

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Wake-on-LAN is just a packet that comes to your PCs network adapter, think of the powerline adapters as a standard patch cable and not a different technology. With Wi-Fi things are more difficult since there's no physical link listening for a magic packet to come through.

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