Friday, July 07, 2006

Bluetooth

Bluetooth has got to be one of the coolest technologies around. It's got a ton of potential, but it has yet to gain widespread acceptance.

Wikipedia entry: Bluetooth

My company works with Jabra so the account manager gave me a couple wireless headsets to try. I used to mock the people that walked around with the little things in their ear, but I've twice forgotten that I was using it and walked into a store with it on.

I have a Kodak Printer Dock Plus Series 3 that has integrated Bluetooth. It's pretty cool because you can print wirelessly from your camera phones that have bluetooth. It's a neat party trick, but not a compelling reason to have bluetooth, admittedly. What was compelling, however, is the fact that I was able to completely remove the printer cable once I installed a Jabra A320s USB bluetooth dongle on the computer. It's only one cable, but I picture a world where all the peripherals connect with the computer wirelessly, and you only have to deal with power cords or replacing batteries.

Things that I wish were all cordless: Mouse, keyboard, speakers, headset, printer, and scanner. I've already got a cordless keyboard and mouse, and now a cordless printer. I just have to get a bluetooth adapter for my main printer, and find out if I can go cordless with a USB scanner. Based on the performance of the Jabra BT620s stereo headset I'm using, I don't think bluetooth speakers are to the point where I want to replace my existing set.

I think once this technology matures a little more, we can look forward to a world with fewer cables.

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