Known working BT dongles / BT stacks

[mwaite]

I've recently purchased a Bolutek BTD-6610 adapter which works out of the box with the Bluetooth Connector on Windows 7 32-bit using the Windows stack (it says on the box it works with XP, Vista, etc.)

Forget your 100m class 1 adapters, this thing has got a range of 2000m and comes equipted with a whacking big aerial which means now it detects my phone before I've even driven onto the drive and this thing is in the middle of the house so it has to go through 3 brick walls too!

http://www.bolutek.com/Products_info.asp?id=267

Any idea if this works with the Widcomm stack? With such a long range, it'd be nice to detect distances!

Edit... I missed the reply just above this one! What does "a patched Widcomm stack" mean/imply?

[DomeAdept]

I can confirm that the Bolutek BTD-6610 also works with a patched Widcomm stack (the Bolutek is CSR based). Range indication works with this setup.

Alex

[gh4un]

Thanks,

Could the signal strength be recorded and used as a locational reference map. Given the relative signal strengths from the different sensors and the appropriate maps, a fairly accurate answer should be achievable. Do you think that this would be feasible.

Also, I was just reading on UWB and this sounds like a very interesting technology for inside positioning. I can't seem to find any consumer level hardware though.

[stipus]

In theory this should work.... However in pratice triangulation is not good enough, and I'm not sure you can use your BT device simultaneously to command HomeSeer...

[gh4un]

Bluetooth Headset with Multiple Dongles

Hello,

I am trying to understand if what I am thinking to do is actually possible with this plugin. What I would like to do is use a bluetooth headset to walk around the house issuing commands to Homeseer, while having the response applied to the particular location within the house, using the triangulation capabilities of the multiple widcom capable receivers. Does the plugin currently look at the signal strength from multiple plugins and triangulate the exact location. This would be great for all kinds of responses, as well as the voice commands I would like to use. I use cat5 - USB baluns which extend USB devices was planning on strategically locating these within differnt rooms to provide the points for triangulation. These would all be connected to one machine, my server in the basement.

Does all of this sound feasible? If so, then what are the suggestions on BT dongles and headsets.

Thanks,

Greg

[Snelvuur]

AIRcable Host XR.

Working with MS stack, dont see ranges ofcourse since i dont have widcomm installed.

But http://docs.google.com/View?docid=dc...ooth_Interface does say it is supported. Tried to install a default widcom stack but so far no luck since i have a belkin usb network hub and placed the device in the center of the house so it finds the phones everywhere in the house. Will test if i can hook it up to the pc and then run the installer again.

[stipus]

Try to
1) Shutdown HomeSeer
2) Delete (or rename) Config/hspi_bt.ini
3) Restart HomeSeer and re-install the plugin from the updater.

[danielbo]

Another day, I have beat myself in the head with this blackberry. This was the best program I ever had and I had to go and switch phones. I would like to know what all to remove to make a clean install. The computer finds the phone, but the program is not finding nothing. I loved this program because I had it set up to turn my oxygen machine on and off, to try to save electric. It worked perfect with my last phone. I wanted to add so much more, like the the alarm system. But, I cant get the this program to find nothing.
Before when I would do the search for the search page it would take a little over a minute to run, now it only takes a half a second. This is why I know its something that has happened to the program also, because the day I got the new phone, homeseer messed up and I did a restore. Now I can not get this program to work and I really loved it more then any that I owned.
Could someone help with what all I should remove before I restore it again. I have ran the install a bunch of times, and thats not getting it.
Please looking for some help,
Danielbo

[danielbo]

I dont know what happened, but on my old blue tooth regular phone all worked great. Then I got a blackberry Storm, I can pair it up with the computer with no problem, but cant get it paired up with your program. It worked perfect with my old phone. Also when I did a search from the program it would run for a couple of minutes searching for a bluetooth item. Then I had some problems with my computer and had to restore some programs and the blue tooth connector had to be one of them. Now the search runs about a half a second. I have uninstalled and reinstalled and made no changes.
The bottom line is the computer is finding my phone, the the program will not. The search runs for about a half a second compared to before it ran about a minute. Any ideas of something I should be doing.
Thanks,
Daniel Bonnell

[Emotion]

Blimey - I have no idea what you're on about - can you explain again for someone as thick as me?

[danielbo]

The phone has paired up with a bluetooth ear piece, which has not been found either when I do the search. As soon as I hit search on the scan for new device, it only scans for about a second, before I had computer problems it seems to me it spent longer searching for a new device. Now it searches for about a half of a second.
This is the error that I get, but I cant find the phone or the ear pieace. It seems to be a search problem. It should be searching longer then a half a second. I again deleted and reinstalled the program. Should I be removing something beside the dll it shows in the interface?


3/3/2010 11:23:24 AM - BT Debug - BT Connector : Network0: Remote Bluetooth Network Enabled= False AutoDiscovery=True AutoDiscoveryInterval=5 No client found


The program was the best program I ever had, and was easy to install. Then something happened to my computer, but is now fine, all but the bluetooth program and that was my favorite program. Worth more then I paid to me.

[Emotion]

Here is the vb.net routine I use to change the poll interval on the Bluetooth Connector to save phone battery power. You create an event when the mobile (cell) phone is detected and issue the following command (e.g.):

ConfigureBluetooth(180, 5, R1)
Where 180 is the Poll Delay, 5 is the number of retries before it gives up and R1 is the HomeSeer device code.

When the phone is disconnected, you want to be able to quickly identify it again, so you'd create an event on Mobile phone disconnected and do the following .net command (e.g.):
ConfigureBluetooth(10, 5, R1)

vb.net code:

Private Sub ConfigureBluetooth(ByVal PollDelay, ByVal LostConfirm, ByVal HsDevice)
Dim SectionName, items, section
Dim FoundSection As Boolean
HsDevice = HsDevice.ToLower
For ds = 0 To 50
SectionName = "Device" & ds.ToString
section = hs.GetINISection(SectionName, "hspi_bt.ini")
If section = "" Then
FoundSection = False
Exit For
End If
items = Split(section, Chr(0))
For I = 0 To UBound(items)
If Strings.Left(items(I), 9) = "HsDevice=" Then
If LCase(Mid(items(I), 10)) = HsDevice Then
FoundSection = True
Exit For
End If
End If
Next
If FoundSection = True Then 'Start configuring
hs.SaveINISetting(SectionName, "PollDelay", PollDelay, "hspi_bt.ini")
hs.SaveINISetting(SectionName, "LostConfirm", LostConfirm, "hspi_bt.ini")
hs.Plugin("BT Connector").scanner.Devices(SectionName).ReloadConfig()
Exit For
End If
Next
End Sub

[Emotion]

How does your battery hold up with BlueTooth enabled? My battery will last 3 days without a charge without BT enabled, maybe a 1/2 day with it enabled. This makes this plugin not feasible for my phone.

Yeah hi AutomatingIT - I had exactly the same problem with my iPhone, although I wouldn't actually manage to get through the day with bluetooth enabled using the Bluetooth Connector.

I now have a script that changes the poll interval from 5 seconds when the cell phone is not detected to 180 seconds when detected (stipus posted how to do this recently). This fixed it on the iPhone completely as Bluetooth only draws power when it's working. It's worth noting that the iPhone is only in discovery mode when on the Bluetooth screen in the Settings app so you have to use Connect Service on the Bluetooth connector as leaving the iPhone in Bluetooth Discovery mode all the time will flatten the battery (plus you won't be able to use it for anything else which is pointless).

I have no idea what phone you've got, but it's worth checking you've not got it set on discovery mode all the time as this will impact batterly life

[AutomatingIT]

How does your battery hold up with BlueTooth enabled? My battery will last 3 days without a charge without BT enabled, maybe a 1/2 day with it enabled. This makes this plugin not feasible for my phone.

[Emotion]

It says it's a transmitter. Is it both a transmitter and receiver? I'm not sure how this increases the output of your cell phone either?

Yeah it's a transmitter and receiver - it's just like any other bluetooth dongle that appears in Windows Device Manager - no difference at all. I guess because it's got a big aerial that's how it can pick up the signal from my iPhone before I've even got to my house - something my Belkin F8T012 couldn't do even when I put it on a lead outside my front door.