What Can You Get in Bluetooth Devices?
What Can You Get in Bluetooth Devices?
Information technology kind of hit a jackpot with Bluetooth. For once, we have an extremely useful telecommunications protocol which became an open standard, and to this day enjoys an open existence while not being owned by any company in particular. That is, the Bluetooth special-interest-group is actually a conglomerate of electronics manufacturers. So it isn't tied up in patents, and it isn't licensed from some company threatening to sue everybody, and it isn't closed-up proprietary abandonware that nobody in the modern day can crack... we got lucky.
For those of you who don't know, Bluetooth is a wireless communications protocol which can currently send and receive at about one megabyte per second. It is perfect for short-range data transmission which doesn't have to be high-bandwidth. One of the technologies it's replacing is infrared signals.
Some cocktail-party trivia: If the name sounds unappetizing, the name comes from the nickname of King Harald I of Denmark and Norway, who ruled in the tenth century. He's responsible for uniting the tribes of Denmark into a single kingdom, which is sort of what Bluetooth does with digital devices. And the logo is actually a combination of two Germanic runes named "Gebo" and "Berkanan."
Now then, here's a list of devices and applications where you'll find Bluetooth technology in action:
Just about any mobile phone or headset. Just about any computer peripheral, using wireless mice, keyboards, and printers. Wireless networking between computers, laptops, PDAs, UMPCs, pocket-PCs, and mobile devices of every stripe. Speakers and headphones. These are all given, and not too surprising.
Lots of industrial applications. Bar-code scanners, medical scanners, police forensic equipment, traffic control equipment, some retail point-of-sale devices, GPS receivers, security equipment. Anything that uses OPEX (OBject EXchange, the binary file transfer protocol) as likely as not runs over Bluetooth.
And now for some of the more surprising and newer applications of Bluetooth:
Game consoles. Both the Nintendo Wii and the Sony PlayStation-3 use Bluetooth technology for their wireless controllers. This has helped to revolutionize gaming technology. The Nintendo Wii in particular has been noted for being revolutionary in having a controller which allows you to combine exercise and video gaming. In your hands, the controller can double for a tennis racket, golf club, katana, fishing rod, lightsaber, pool cue, laser cannon, and anything else you can imagine.
Small home accessories which use Bluetooth are also becoming possible as well. Bluetooth-enabled TV remotes and garage-door openers haven't yet become commonplace, but their day is coming.
Another growing field is "telehealth" devices. These are devices associated with remote patient monitoring, implanted devices, and sensory aides. Your future pacemaker or insulin monitor may use Bluetooth to communicate with a base in your home or the doctor's office.
Finally, Bluetooth has shown the ultimate sign of adoption - it's starting to show up in marketing! Yes, it is slowly becoming a common occurrence: you're at the mall, walking along by the shops and looking at your phone, when it suddenly displays an advertisement from a store you're passing. Hmmm, we hope that doesn't get too annoying, but even so, it still sounds kind of cool.
And just to balance the cool comment.. Here's the Microsoft driver model!
Filed Under: Featured • PDAs • Product Reviews
