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Bluetooth 5

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21–30 of 68 posts

Re: Bluetooth 5

#21
post #17

Yay, even better opportunities for government and corporations to track my whereabouts through my Bluetooth signature. ;) Tongue-in-cheek, well mostly but not entirely .. I do appreciate e.g. accurate travel times, yet refuse to believe they won't take it to the next step. http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/how-vicroads-tracks-your-e...

Yet nothing new on the security side. Figures. How many cars can be hacked now thanks to Bluetooth-based locks? Millions?

Re: Bluetooth 5

#22
post #6

I've been really fascinated recently by whipping out my smartphone in public and using a Bluetooth LE explorer app to look at what's being advertised, and it's brilliant. We are all constantly surrounded by devices which are screaming data about themselves everywhere they go. Bluetooth 5 seems to increase the range of LE communications, but since I'm almost sure we're going to have some horrible public hack of one of…

> We are all constantly surrounded by devices which are screaming data about themselves everywhere they go. Perhaps you would like to explain what the problem with this is? Broadcasting presence in itself is not a security hole - unless you think "Do not broadcast SSID" is a WiFi AP security feature (it's not). If WiFi can be secured (with devices that "scream data about themselves"), why would Bluetooth be any diffe…

I feel it's an Orwellian privacy issue. If you capture Bluetooth signatures in myriad places, you should be able to track where people are going with relative ease. Increasing the range without adding security features (if that's the case) would do nothing to ameliorate such concerns.

Re: Bluetooth 5

#23
post #4

Isn't it time for uncompressed A2DP audio at last? It would solve both quality (generation loss) and latency issues.

aptX already allows high-quality audio streaming over BT and has both a lossless and a low-latency mode. Device support is also already here, I saw a few last time I was in an electronics store.

aptX support different modes, but not all of them can run within the constraints of a Bluetooth link. There simply isn't enough bitrate in the old Bluetooth for uncompressed audio. If there was enough of it, you wouldn't need aptX or any other specialty codec, you would just run PCM and that's it. Even ADPCM at half the bitrate would be a big improvement (particularly, for latency), but there is not enough bitrate even for that.

Re: Bluetooth 5

#24
post #15

What will it take for wireless keyboards and mice to use Bluetooth? Most ship with their own custom dongle. A single port MacBook, for example, doesn't really make sense until Bluetooth devices become more popular.

Quite often nowadays devices have BT support but also offer a "dongle" or usb connection point as well (in case your computer doesn't have BT).

It's a solved problem I believe since BT LE (low energy) I believe. Now it's just a matter of market adoption.

Re: Bluetooth 5

#25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We are all constantly surrounded by devices which are screaming data about themselves everywhere they go. It's also terrible that people, and their clothing, are so detectable in the visible light spectrum. Where's the 'tarnkappe' when you need it? ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloak_of_invisibility ) Also appreciate the "will be marketed as 'Bluetooth 5.' [no dot zero]". Sounds like a band name, or a gang. Good…

It's also terrible that people, and their clothing, are so detectable in the visible light spectrum. I wasn't completely clear above, but there are a couple of differences: - Your clothing doesn't contain unique identifiers (yet!) :) - The devices seem to often be happy to broadcast their information in the clear. Your clothes don't advertise your position or heart rate to the whole world either!

They do "broadcast" where you shop (if someone knows where your clothes are from), what kind of job you have, your social class and many other informations about the person.

Re: Bluetooth 5

#26
post #15

What will it take for wireless keyboards and mice to use Bluetooth? Most ship with their own custom dongle. A single port MacBook, for example, doesn't really make sense until Bluetooth devices become more popular.

Microsoft makes a Bluetooth keyboard that is ok. Not great, but there aren't many options. Dell makes a Bluetooth "travel" mouse that is actually pretty good. A little small, but lots of buttons.

I've also found that many proprietary dongle keyboards work over USB-OTG on Android phones.

Re: Bluetooth 5

#27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also terrible that people, and their clothing, are so detectable in the visible light spectrum. I wasn't completely clear above, but there are a couple of differences: - Your clothing doesn't contain unique identifiers (yet!) :) - The devices seem to often be happy to broadcast their information in the clear. Your clothes don't advertise your position or heart rate to the whole world either!

They do "broadcast" where you shop (if someone knows where your clothes are from), what kind of job you have, your social class and many other informations about the person.

Well, that's very true. At least its easy for everyone to see what they're sharing there though!

Re: Bluetooth 5

#28
post #4

Isn't it time for uncompressed A2DP audio at last? It would solve both quality (generation loss) and latency issues.

I switched to high quality bluetooth headphones (Sony MDR-XB950BT) last year that use aptX codecs and the quality is superb (i am not an audiophile though). In the past i had problems with audio lag when using bluetooth while watching movies, but even that is so low now that i don't notice it and forget about it, while before i was very sensitive about audio not being perfectly in sync with the frames on the screen.

Re: Bluetooth 5

#29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What app have you been using?

LightBlue Explorer – https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/lightblue-explorer-bluetooth... I have no idea if it's particularly good in comparison to others, but I downloaded it to debug a Bluetooth LE device I was building and it was a pretty straightforward UI.

It's the standard one, pretty much. The one everyone uses...

Re: Bluetooth 5

#30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We are all constantly surrounded by devices which are screaming data about themselves everywhere they go. It's also terrible that people, and their clothing, are so detectable in the visible light spectrum. Where's the 'tarnkappe' when you need it? ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloak_of_invisibility ) Also appreciate the "will be marketed as 'Bluetooth 5.' [no dot zero]". Sounds like a band name, or a gang. Good…

It's also terrible that people, and their clothing, are so detectable in the visible light spectrum. I wasn't completely clear above, but there are a couple of differences: - Your clothing doesn't contain unique identifiers (yet!) :) - The devices seem to often be happy to broadcast their information in the clear. Your clothes don't advertise your position or heart rate to the whole world either!

Your clothing doesn't contain unique identifiers

But your face does...

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