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Bluetooth: dead or alive?

Posted on 21 Nov 2002 at 15:36

The more distant clouds have silver linings as well. Although the industry is likely to concentrate on stability in favour of upping the specification in the near future, Bluetooth is expected to increase in speed to 3-4Mb/sec and 10Mb/sec in coming years, which will help to fight off upstarts like UWB.

But we should learn a lesson from Bluetooth's struggle. Much like the British tabloids build up celebrities just to make their fall from grace all the more glorious, don't believe all the hype about new technologies. They may promise much on paper - just as UWB and ZigBee do now - but compatibility, operating system support and cost are all major barriers.

Ultimately, if the technology is good enough, and it has enough uses, it will battle through the barriers. Bluetooth has now done exactly that and perhaps - just perhaps - in a couple of years' time it will actually be in every notebook, every PDA and every phone, as we hoped it would be by now.