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Mother · 08-13-2002

I have the following BlueTooth devices:

- Nokia 6310i.
- Toshiba Portege 4000.
- Anycom CF card.
- 3Com USB dongle.

So far, the only combination that has worked OK has been the Nokia with the Anycom card - setup went fine first time, connected, and has been working ever since.

The 3Com USB dongle installs OK under XP, but every two reboots or so, XP fails to load the drivers for it - which means having to reinstall them. Since BlueTooth uses mostly virtual serial ports to communicate with other devices, each time you reinstall the drivers they create new ports, above the old ones. After a few re-installations, you'll end up with COM56: and such.

The Toshiba and Nokia don't talk to each other - they are seen and identified, but no luck at pairing them. I believe this is Nokia's fault, and in the next firmware it will be fixed...

All this makes me state: BlueTooth sucks. At least in it's current state of development. The manufacturers are being stupid distributing buggy and defective products, most of which are likely not firmware-upgradeable - this will create a consumer base largely peed off at BlueTooth in general, who will have spent their money in bad products, and will not fork out more money to buy new ones with the problems fixed.

Nice idea, poorly implemented, like a lot of nice ideas. A large part of the problem I think is that each manufacturer "interprets" the BlueTooth standard to his own liking, which makes it non-interoperable, the most basic aim of the technology.

Cheers,

Mother

P.S. maybe this should go in the off-topic board?

08-13-2002	#14 (permalink)
Mother Too many secrets... Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: Barcelona, Spain Posts: 204	Now that I've tried myself I can answer... I have the following BlueTooth devices: - Nokia 6310i. - Toshiba Portege 4000. - Anycom CF card. - 3Com USB dongle. So far, the only combination that has worked OK has been the Nokia with the Anycom card - setup went fine first time, connected, and has been working ever since. The 3Com USB dongle installs OK under XP, but every two reboots or so, XP fails to load the drivers for it - which means having to reinstall them. Since BlueTooth uses mostly virtual serial ports to communicate with other devices, each time you reinstall the drivers they create new ports, above the old ones. After a few re-installations, you'll end up with COM56: and such. The Toshiba and Nokia don't talk to each other - they are seen and identified, but no luck at pairing them. I believe this is Nokia's fault, and in the next firmware it will be fixed... All this makes me state: BlueTooth sucks. At least in it's current state of development. The manufacturers are being stupid distributing buggy and defective products, most of which are likely not firmware-upgradeable - this will create a consumer base largely peed off at BlueTooth in general, who will have spent their money in bad products, and will not fork out more money to buy new ones with the problems fixed. Nice idea, poorly implemented, like a lot of nice ideas. A large part of the problem I think is that each manufacturer "interprets" the BlueTooth standard to his own liking, which makes it non-interoperable, the most basic aim of the technology. Cheers, Mother P.S. maybe this should go in the off-topic board?