The Computer Revolution/Networks/Short Range Wireless for Personal Area Networks

From Wikibooks, open books for an open world
Jump to navigation Jump to search

Short range wireless technology is used to connect personal area networks to personal electronics. These could be your cellphone, you printers, your PDAs, your MP3 players and what not. So far the most famous is Bluetooth which is now joined with Ultra wideband (UWB). It is also connected with wireless USB. Bluetooth connects cellphones, PDAs, computers and other external devices on PCs. It is a short range wireless device so it can connect to devices up to 30 feet away. Bluetooth was at first designed to replace the hassle of cables that were connecting PCs to external devices such as printers and scanners and to overcome "line of sight" problems by using infrared transmission. The original version of Bluetooth technology could transmit up to 720 kilobits per second and was name after Harold Bluetooth who was a Danish King who united Norway and Denmark. The Ultra wideband was a technology developed by the military to increase transfer speeds to up to 480 megabits per second. At a 30 feet connection UWB sent out millions of waves of radio energy at different frequencies every second. The broken bits were then reassembled by the UWB receiver. Sometime along in this year it is predicted that cellphones will inherit this technology and will be able to transfer media from their PCs to their cellphones without adapters or cables. Wireless USB is based on this same technology (UWB). Ranging up to 32 feet it can still transfer up to 480 megabits per second and is said to be a natural replacement for USB cables.