singin the bluetooth blues 17 december, 2000 by johnmichael patrick monty monteith

Bluetooth will be setting the world on fire with it's wireless data connectivity. Imagine a world without wires where a person could print a page from their PDA or laptop on a client's printer without needing to hook up cables or install drivers. Imagine being able to send data between your cell phone, PDA, and laptop without hooking up a single wire. The connectivity options are endless, and everyone is talking about the amazing Bluetooth revolution coming any day now. Except, they have forgotten one little point .. This really is not all that revolutionary. In fact, the technology is available to do all of this today.

Yes, Bluetooth certainly wins the current 'gee wiz that's cool' award, even though it is potentially years from widespread adoption. It is getting ten times the press of items that are nearly available and will have a far more dramatic effect on the computing industry, such as Mac OS X, and the Transmeta microprocessors. With the Bluetooth chipset still costing an arm and a leg, and troubles with RF interference in other common devices still on the table to be ironed out, you will not be buying your first Bluetooth PDA for a couple of years.

However, the most amazing thing to me when listening to Bluetooth praises is the myth that the idea behind this technology is something new. In fact, a similar technology that received just as much attention has been with us for years and currently has widespread adoption, even though it is rarely used. Today I can walk over to our HP8100 printer and print, without wires, from my PDA or laptop. How? Infrared port, of course. Yes, you have to point the sucker, and yes infrared technology is slower than Bluetooth. But, keep in mind that Bluetooth is not going to be a speed demon either. Even if it were, the type of applications people are so excited about, such as printing directly, or transferring a file, do not require CAT-5 networked speed. The applications people are going ga-ga about could be done with infrared.

Yet, even though infrared could do the job, no one seems to be using it.
The reason for infrared's lackluster use is hard to pin-point. There is a big gee-wiz factor in printing and transferring data without wires, but as far as practical use, it is more of a once-a-month used item, at best. How often do I need to print directly from a Palm Pilot when the data is already in Outlook on my desktop anyway? How often do I need to transfer a file from my laptop to a desktop when I usually just plug the laptop into the network when I am at home or work anyway? How often would I need to transfer data between my cell phone and computer? I have a cable I can connect my cell phone to my computer but have only used it once for initially downloading my phone numbers from Outlook. While being able to transfer data wirelessly would be nice, and certainly is something I look forward to, it is hardly going to set the world on fire.

Then there is the bigger issue of widespread adoption. Remember that infrared was going to be the biggest thing ever, but even today infrared is not nearly the mainstream item everyone said it would be. Only a few printers even have the option of an infrared port, even though the technology is cheap. PDA's and laptops usually have an infrared port, but now they are starting to ship without. And getting an infrared port for your desktop system is a chore. And this is for a technology that many consider to be widely adopted. How often have you printed something or transferred a file without any wires assisting?

Bluetooth faces the same problem. Even when you buy your Bluetooth PDA or cell phone, chances are it will be a couple of years before the printers and computers you need to connect with are also wired for the technology. If they ever are.

Do not get me wrong. I like the technology, and I am excited about Bluetoothing my data through the day. Some of the other applications they are thinking about using for this, such as web pad remote control of desktops and using a cell phone for an Internet connection on your PDA without a wire sounds like nice stuff. As cool of this stuff is, however, I would sooner wait in line for Mac OS X.