Adding Bluetooth to Vex

[Joe Johnson]

As I have said before, I am really happy with AirCables, and recommend that you try to use one of there products.

If you want 100m range, you are going to have to go with something with an antenna. The AirCables parts with antennas are listed as "coming soon" But, I would call or e-mail Juergen at AirCables. I think they are shipping some of these 100m products but have not updated their website.

The PC side is pretty straightfoward. The USB dongle from AirCables is only a Class 2 (10m) device but there are many, many, many "Class 1" (100m) Bluetooth USB Dongles available that you can use to make your connection to the robot. I have never used any of them so I can't help you with a specific recommendation. But, I have used many of the 10m devices and they basically all work okay. The only difference between them is whether they use the standard WindowsXP BT driver or whether they have written their own. I had pretty good success with a Linksys 10m dongle as well as the AirCable 10m dongel part for what it is worth. As to the programming, once the device is installed and the BT radios have been paired and connected, the BT driver provides transparent virtual COM port.

Hope this helps.

Joe J.

P.S. I take back many of the good things I said about the SMART Modular Bluetooth Serial Adapter above -- I can't speak for other applications, but for mine, they ended up being the source of subtle problems that were very hard to find but caused me fits for MONTHS. Your mileage may vary... JJ