Sprint's XOHM Broadband Wireless Internet Service at Demonstrated at WiMAX Smart Home Exhibit

10/3/08 - Motorola, Inc. (NYSE: MOT) and Sprint (NYSE: S) offered a first taste of XOHM service to guests attending a WiMAX open house event last night at Chicago's famed Smart Home. The Smart Home was built using green building techniques, technology that manages home energy use, and is designed with the latest in communications technology in mind.

Attendees were able to sample WiMAX in action throughout the Smart Home, a three-story structure located at Chicago's Museum of Science & Industry. As an event exclusive, guests were able to connect to Sprint's live Chicago XOHM commercial network via laptops and devices on walkways surrounding the Smart Home.

"The Smart Home was a perfect venue for Motorola to show -- using a typical user's home environment -- how our WiMAX solutions are accelerating the delivery of personal media experiences," said Fred Wright, senior vice president, Motorola Home & Networks Mobility. "It also was a compelling demonstration of what XOHM service will offer when Sprint launches service in Chicago."

"The recent launch of WiMAX service in Baltimore shows XOHM is clearly gaining momentum," said Atish Gude, senior vice president, Mobile Broadband Operations for Sprint. "With XOHM people can enjoy desktop-like broadband speeds on WiMAX-capable mobile devices in and beyond the home and office environment, and we look forward to bringing that experience to Chicago."

Inside the home, a Motorola WiMAX network powered demonstrations of media mobility, showing how family members can stay connected to their content while moving throughout the home or on their mobile device as they enter and leave their home environment. Other demonstrations included video streaming, remote home management capabilities, home telephony over WiMAX and gaming.

Motorola's recently announced wi4 WiMAX USB adaptor (USBw 100), the x24 automotive telemetry device, information on its WiMAX interoperability testing (IOT) program and more can be seen at WiMAX World 2008, Sept. 30 - Oct. 2, at Chicago's McCormick Place. Motorola is in stand #601.

Bluetooth headset turns to SUN and goes green

Last year, I purchased a hands-free Bluetooth car kit as a Christmas gift for a family member who, as a sales rep, spends significant time talking in her car. Worried for her safety as she drives with one hand on the wheel and the other around a cell phone, I initially felt a sense of pride as she unwrapped a gift that demonstrated concern for her well-being. Sometimes, however, a buzz can be short-lived. After a quick explanation of what the gift was, I could see a bit of uneasiness creep in as she unraveled the 3-foot long charger cord and asked if it would be necessary to keep this plugged into the single charger in the front seat of the car. She soon came to the realization that "hands-free" was not "cords-free."

I assured her that, after an initial charge, she would only need to occasionally plug in the hands-free car kit, freeing up the outlet for her cell phone. After juicing things up, we quickly had the device paired with her cell phone and she was off and using the hands-free device. It wasn't long before a week's lapse in charging left the car kit out of gas and no longer paired to her Bluetooth-enabled phone. The process of hanging the charging cord from the roof of her car to the outlet, combined with the re-pairing of the device, soon sent the hands-free car kit to the electronic junk bin, where other well-meaning gifts had already met a similar fate.

Looking back over the years at the Bluetooth headsets I've purchased for my own use, I soon realized that they too had gone the way of the hands-free car kit for the same reason--another cord to carry and another device to charge. Ugh.

So, it was with great enthusiasm that I ordered the Iqua SUN for a Portelligent teardown, to see how advances in Bluetooth and integrated solar power could enable a Bluetooth device that may never need to be plugged in. According to the company's Web site and product packaging, Iqua claims the SUN is the world's first solar powered Bluetooth headset with the potential for infinite standby time if exposed to sunlight on a regular basis. If a cord were truly no longer needed, perhaps this could be a Bluetooth-enabled gift able to escape the fate of hands-free car kits and other gadgets whose shine faded with time.

At a price of $70, the Iqua SUN costs $20 to $30 more than comparable non-solar powered Bluetooth headsets. Weighing 14 grams and occupying a surface area of 11 cm sq., the SUN is both heavier and larger than today's smallest Bluetooth headsets, such as a recently analyzed Samsung WEP500, which weighed in at less than 10 g and had a surface area approaching 6 cm sq. While non-solar-powered Bluetooth headset manufacturers are constantly striving for smaller form factors, limited only by the size of the small lithium-ion battery housed in the headset, shrinking the size of the SUN may not be in Iqua's best interests due to the surface area required for the 4 cm sq. amorphous silicon solar cell.

After disconnecting and removing the solar cell, measurements indicated a maximum open circuit voltage of 4.1 V in direct sunlight. Maximum short-circuit current in direct sunlight was approximately 5 mA. These numbers indicate a solar cell with a peak output of 10 mW to 15 mW when normalized according to conventional wisdom for combining open-circuit/short-circuit measured outputs. Fluorescent office lighting with indirect sunlight generated a less hardy figure of under 1 mW from the solar cell.

Recharge occasionally

Power consumption of the SUN, while turned on and waiting for a Bluetooth connection, was miserly, averaging just 2 mW. After connecting to a Bluetooth-enabled cell phone, the SUN consumed about 4 mW while waiting for a call and 50 mW while a conversation was ongoing. The power consumption numbers compare favorably with other recent Bluetooth headsets analyzed by Portelligent, including the ultra-small, coin-cell-powered Samsung WEP500. The low power of the Iqua SUN combined with its 110-mAh lithium-polymer battery provide a standby time approaching 200 hours and a talk time of 8 hours to 9 hours, figures consistent with Iqua's stated claims.

The minimal power consumption combined with the built-in solar cell recharger enables the SUN to have infinite standby time, as long as it spends a reasonable amount of time in direct sunlight. The spread between the power generated by the solar cell in direct sunlight and the standby power consumption can also provide some additional battery charge for talk time. Nonetheless, add up all the numbers and it seems heavy talkers will still have to sporadically plug in and recharge through the USB connection on the back of the Iqua SUN headset.

Only one major IC, a Cambridge Silicon Radio BC413159B, populates the 8 cm sq. PCB manufactured by Primax Electronics. The integrated Bluetooth radio and baseband IC is contained in an 8 mm x 8 mm package and includes an audio CODEC, 6 Mb of embedded ROM, and power management for a fully integrated, v2.0+EDR Bluetooth solution. With all functions contained on a single die, CSR provided Iqua with a solution that enables the extremely long standby and talk times along with the ability to be recharged through a small solar cell.

While taking apart the Iqua SUN and pondering the benefits of integrating a solar panel into a Bluetooth headset, I thought back to the hands-free car kit bought as a gift the year prior. A solar-powered Bluetooth car kit, if mounted near a window, would perhaps be an even better variation on the theme, given abundant sunlight available in the car. Alas, you have to be quick in this industry. Just as a business plan was coalescing, Iqua announced the VizorSUN at the beginning of September. Instead of providing unlimited standby, Iqua is making the bold promise of unlimited talk time under optimum lighting conditions for the visor-mounted hands-free car kit. With hands-free finally (maybe) becoming cords-free, perhaps one more Bluetooth-enabled gift will find its way into the holiday mix, and will manage to steer clear of the electronics junk-bin.

See related image: The Iqua SUN provides virtually endless standby time if you give it enough solar exposure.

The SUN is good, but the company says the new Vizor-SUN is even better. Forget unlimited standby time-think unlimited talk time.

Source: EETimes.com

Bell launches Samsung U740 Double Flip

Bell, a major Canadian telecommunications company, announced the release of the Samsung U740. This messaging phone features a dual-flip design like Samsung's D307, but with a thinner profile and for CDMA networks. Key features include a QWERTY keyboard, EVDO high-speed data, music player, and memory card slot. Other features include Bluetooth, location-based services, a camera, advanced voice dialing, and dual color displays.

The slim Samsung SCH-U740 mobile phone has a pivot design that makes texting easy. A unique black and champagne color scheme also helps you make a statement. With Samsung, it's not that hard to imagine. The U740 has a portrait mode for the phone calls and a landscape mode for writing text messages. The Samsung U740 will use Bell's high speed wireless connections. It is available with a contract for $149.99. It is also available without a contract, but this time, its $379.99.

Specification

Pivot Design
Full QWERTY Keyboard
Slim Form Factor
V CAST Music and Video
Bluetooth® Wireless Technology
1.3 Megapixel Camera
Camcorder
High Speed Data Network

Source: mobilewhack.com

Bluetooth Spamming now legal in UK

Bluetooth spamming, or Bluespamming, as it is often referred to, has just become fully legal in the UK.

The British Information Commissioners Office (ICO) has set new guidelines for electronic consumer marketing, that will regulate the flow of spam, by requiring users to "opt-in" to receive the marketing, but incredibly have removed Bluetooth from their list of regulated communications mediums.

So what this means to you and I (if we were living in the UK), is that companies have been given the green light to spam us as we walk through the city, via our bluetooth-enabled phones.

Here are both the before and after wordings of the legislation:

Before:

In other words, both email and text, picture and video marketing messages are considered to be 'electronic mail'. Marketing messages transmitted using 'Bluetooth'technology, for example, messages sent to all 'Bluetooth' enabled handsets within a given radius, are also considered to be 'electronic mail', as are WAP messages. WAP Push allows a sender to send a specially formatted SMS message to a handset which, when received, allows a recipient through a single click to access and view content stored online, through the browser on the handset. (View the entire guidance v 2.0 Dec. '06 )

After:

In other words, both email and text, picture and video marketing messages are considered to be 'electronic mail'. Marketing transmitted in WAP messages is considered to be 'electronic mail'. WAP Push allows a sender to send a specially formatted SMS message to a handset which, when received, allows a recipient through a single click to access and view content stored online, through the browser on the handset. ( View the entire guidance, Version 3.1 Oct. '07)

I do not know who's smoking what over at the ICO, but I want some!

Bluetooth helps find new Facebook friends

Bath University scientists in the UK have created a tool which uses unique ID of Bluetooth devices, like cellphones, to build new friendship networks in the hugely popular social network Facebook.

Users register with the Facebook tool, called Cityware, to track encounters in the real world via Bluetooth.

"Networks are everywhere - social and digital. The really nice thing about Bluetooth is that when you are walking down the street, although you are not talking to anyone, your Bluetooth device can be talking to other devices.

"People with Bluetooth devices are actually creating an ad-hoc communications infrastructure where information can flow through the city over time." says Dr Vassilis Kostakos, research associate at the University of Bath.

The way Cityware works is, the tool lets users find out if any of the Bluetooth device users they bump into regularly are Cityware users, and have profiles on Facebook. If so, they can then choose to add that person to their friends' list.

The tool works in four parts: Facebook account, Cityware application, Bluetooth device and Cityware node.

Cityware users must have a Facebook account, install the Cityware application, and register the Bluetooth ID of their mobile phone or laptop with the software.

The researchers have set up a series of nodes around the United Kingdom and at locations in the United States. These nodes are computers which constantly scan for Bluetooth-enabled devices in a given area, and send that information back to servers which compare the IDs of the Bluetooth devices with any enabled Facebook profiles. Nodes have been set up in Bath, University College London, the University of California in San Diego, with more nodes to soon go online in Sweden, Hong Kong and Sydney.

"We are interested in understanding how cities work, how people move around. More recently we have been looking at how viruses spread in cities - biological and digital viruses."

The ambition for the Facebook tool is to have mobile phones alert each other when in the proximity of another Facebook user who shares common interests or common friends.

Best Bluetooth device of 2006

Now that the 2006 is coming to an end there is the usual rush to award prices for the best (insert category here) award of the year. Bluetooth devices do not elude this kind of things and one of the products that we hear more often than not is the Hug Shirt.

It is a shirt that takes care of the most important things that physically cannot be carried over a cell phone: feelings. Certainly you can try to communicate them with your words, a great message or picture but nothing is better than a warm hug. You will not be there to give the hug but the shirt will take care of it for you.

The Hug Shirt is in fact a Bluetooth accessory that transmits from a distance several human characteristics associated with hugs. In particular it registers and communicates the heartbeat rate, the skin warmth and the strength of touch of the sender. These values are registered using sensor embedded in the shirt of the sender.

Then the values are sent by the mobile phone (like a normal text message) to your friend’s or lover’s phone. There they are interpreted and, via Bluetooth, send to the Hug Shirt that simulates the hug by applying the \"values\" of the sender.

This great invention, produced by CuteCircuit, on paper may seem a bit to wear but the manufacturer paid particular attention to the wearability. The Hug Shirt is in fact realized using textiles, cotton and micro-fiber to make it as comfortable as possible. Lastly for those worried about how to wash the shirt there is no need to worry since it’s fully washable.

Add Bluetooth to your cell phone

We can safely say that Bluetooth is one of the most used wireless technology for mobile phones (and not only for them). For this reason it’s integrated in almost all the recent cell phones that hit the market.

There are some exception though and even a lot of old models do not have Bluetooth on-board. Until now if you really wanted or needed this technology your only choice would have been to buy a new cell phone. That can be pretty expensive so it’s great to know that now we have an alternative: the Movon MAG1.

This gadget was created by Movon, a South Korean firm specialized in Bluetooth devices. It is a Bluetooth dongle designed for all those cell phones that do not support Bluetooth.

Using it with the every kind of mobile phones is very easy. All you have to do is to plug the Movon MAG1 where you normally would plug wired devices. Then all it takes is the press of a single button (the big one in the center of the Bluetooth dongle) and your are ready to use the wireless technology.

Because it can be used with old cell phones that do not optimize their power consumption Movon also thought about that. The information about the MAG1 consumption is a bit misleading but this lightweight device (only 12 grams) can guarantee several hours of continuous use.

Unfortunately the Movon MAG1 will be available only in South Korea and there are no plans yet to market it elsewhere.

BlueICE - Use Bluetooth devices from startup

If you use mouses or keyboards that work only wirelessly via Bluetooth you know that some PC operations are beyond your reach. For example you cannot access the BIOS to change some settings or update it. Or, if you use an operating system that supports the passing of parameters to the kernel, you cannot use this advanced option because the keyboard is not active.

When using Bluetooth this happens because you have to wait for the operating system to boot and load the necessary drivers or software. So until the OS is ready the Bluetooth devices cannot be connected and therefore used. For this reason the user has to keep handy a wired mouse and keyboard just in case the boot goes wrong.

Now CSR plc, a British Bluetooth chip specialist, developed a solution for this problem. It is a software called BlueCore Input Connection Enhancement (BlueICE) that works using a host interface built into a PC or housed in a dongle and the BlueCore4-EXT silicon.

At start-up the regular host module presents itself as a USB composite device so devices can be used immediately. The host module can then be reversed to operate as a Bluetooth device allowing the devices to talk with other devices that support the specification.

This solution will enable PC manufactures to bundle directly Bluetooth keyboard and mouses without having to use only wired devices. If largely adopted BlueICE would also increase dramatically the diffusion of Bluetooth devices since it solves one of the biggest issues. By the CSR estimate the market for Bluetooth keyboards and mouses will jump up to 340 million units.

Listen music, make calls in car with Motorola T605

At this year SEMA Show Motorola is showing its latest Bluetooth-enabled products and there are several interesting new devices. One of them is the Automotive Motorola Music and Hands-Free System T605.

This Bluetooth middle-tier device enables the car occupants to wirelessly listen to streaming music or make phone calls. It requires a Bluetooth compatible cell phone and/or a Bluetooth compatible music source.

It works by transferring the call or the music to the car sound system that obviously must be compatible with the Bluetooth standard. If your MP3 player cannot use Bluetooth Motorola will also include in the retail box a 3.5mm standard stereo jack for a wired connection.

The T605 supports the 2.0 version of Bluetooth meaning that it can use profiles like Advanced Audio Distribution Profile, Audio Video Remote Control Profile and the Hands-free Profile. For a list of devices compatible with the T605 Motorola you can visit the http://www.hellomoto.com/bluetooth webpage.

One of the best features of the T605 is the ability to automatically mute the music when a phone call is received and resume it when the call is over.

During phone calls the T605 is also able to process the input signal by applying noise and echo reduction technologies to obtain the maximum quality. In addition the Music and Hands-Free System T605 also offers full-duplex capabilities and the proprietary EasyPair technology to streamline the setup process.

Motorola announced that this Bluetooth device will be available starting from the first half of 2007 but has not yet announced its price. The press release also adds that there will be the possibility to personalize the system buying separately a professional installation and an adapter harness.

JBL Bluetooth Headphones for iPod

When it comes to Bluetooth headphones everyone has its own preferences and one of the variables that we have to consider when buy a new set is the type of headphones. Do we want the smaller ones or the larger one? The manufacturers have made a choice for us by distributing mainly the smaller ones because of their convenience for outdoor (read running) usage.

However if you prefer a pair of larger Bluetooth headphones JBL has created a model for you. It�s the Reference Series 610 that is designed with an ear cup (plus some more to cover completely the ear) size and uses leather to provide the maximum comfort.

Using the Bluetooth connection the Reference Series 610 can be paired with any device that supports this standard like, for example, laptops, phones, and iPods. One of the earcups has a power switch while the other contains usual the controls to adjust volume, select tracks, and play or pause the music.

If for some reason you do not want to use the Bluetooth connection JBL has included a 1.75 cable to connect the Reference Series 610 headphones to any devices you want. The retail box also contains two types of jack adapters for headphones: �� and airplane.

JBL equipped the headphones with a rechargeable battery that can be connected to the wall using the universal battery charged included in the box.

The price has been set to $199.95 and JBL has also announced that this Bluetooth headphone will be on sale starting from November and will be available in two different versions: black and white.

Bluetooth allows Iraq war wounded to walk again

The way we use and employ technology has changed considerably over the past few years. Innovation is the keyword today, and here is an example of innovation being put up for human use.

A wounded Iraq war veteran is able to walk again, using artificial legs fitted with Bluetooth technology.

Marine Lance Cpl. Joshua Bleill, whose legs were mutilated when a bomb exploded under his vehicle in Iraq on October 26, 2006, has been provided with a set of prosthetic legs which use Bluetooth to communicate with each other to function.


Bleill has several stitches in his abdomen, and a 6-inch screw is holding his pelvis together. Bluetooth has turned his bane to boon, and has now enabled him to walk again.