Using an "internal" Bluetooth card


avoiding the dongle...

Those of use who have older PowerBooks know that the only way to utilise Bluetooth was with a Bluetooth Dongle, specifically the D-Link DWB-120M or DBT-120.



I also managed to get the 3COM USB Bluetooth adapter to work, but it was huge and impractical.

However a real issue was that the D-Link adapters were USB and stuck out which meant when not using the PowerBook, you generally had to unplug it and if you forgot you had to reboot.

It seemed to make sense to use a Bluetooth PCMCIA Card, however, plugging one of these in usually resulted in nothing!

I then heard about Card Blues Suite which was a piece of software which allowed PowerBook users to utilise a Bluetooth PCMCIA card. I downloaded the software, installed, plugged in the spare 3COM Bluetooth card and nothing!

I have the wrong version of the card.



I had the

3Com Wireless Bluetooth PC Card Version 2.0 (3CRWB6096)

and you need

3Com Wireless Bluetooth PC Card Version 3.0 (3CRWB6096B)

Having then ordered the revised version of the Bluetooth card, plugged it in and it worked fine without issues.

Since then I have used the card with my Bluetooth phone, have sent files from the iPAQ to the PowerBook and a few other things such as send SMS messages from the Mac.

No more sticking out dongles...

Posted: Fri - May 7, 2004 at 12:42 PM         | |

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