Case study: We mapped out the home-based SOHO network for a colleague that is centered on her cable wireless-n router/hub with a 30Mbps connection to the Internet. There is lots of spare storage capacity and computer power on here, so she’s looking for creative ideas on how to make the most of what’s available.

Four RJ45 cables connect the hub to two network-attached storage (NAS) drives, a 1 Terabyte and a 500 Gigabyte drive, a Pogoplug cloud engine, and a fourth links to a laptop when a hard-wired LAN connection to the router is required for firmware updates and settings modifications.

The wireless hub also serves any iOS devices as well as the wireless-n card in any laptops in the SOHO. The Apple iOS devices not only back up to Apple’s iCloud automatically but automatically sync photos from those devices using the Pogoplug (either to its attached storage or into its cloud space). Conversely, files on an attached USB drive or SD card from a digital camera can be made available to the iOS devices via the Pogoplug app.

The laptops all have DropBox accounts to sync important data files with the cloud. Strong encryption ensures all synced files are safe from anyone who might hack DropBox. The primary laptop also syncs to Wuala.com, which Sciencetext has also mentioned recently. It is a cloud service based in Europe and uses its desktop program to encrypt files before they are synced. Wuala is thus not only inaccessible to the prying eyes of the US authorities but also never knows your password, making it perhaps the most secure cloud service available.

Also on the network are two Western Digital devices, a WDTV (wirelessly connected with an attached 1 Tb USB drive) and a 1 Tb WD Live TV Hub (connected via power-supply networking), which also has the option of attaching more USB storage. Both devices have HDMI out to flat-panel TVs. And, have a suite of services for using certain areas of the internet, such as Youtube, Facebook, RSS, Spotify, and more. One TV has cable with a time-shifting proprietary PVR akin to Tivo, the other TV has terrestrial digital and an attached 160Gb PVR.

Now, the question is…with all this connectivity, cloud storage, and disk space what novel use might it be put? Creative ideas to complete the case study gratefully received.

One reader has already suggested adding a “disconnection” option…