Bluetooth won't fry your brain

While World+dog are in agreement that Bluetooth is a jolly clever technology, it finds itself in a very similar position to that of USB a couple of years ago: nice idea, no products. But now French phone behemoth Alcatel is to embed a Cambridge Silicon Radio (CSR) Bluetooth chip in the battery packs of its OneTouch 500 and 700 GSM phones, enabling cordless hands-free operation and thus avoiding the much-publicised risk of conventional headsets acting as an antenna and cooking the user's brain. CSRs Bluecore 01 single chip Bluetooth product will also allow the phones to communicate with handhelds and PCs, says Alcatel. CSR's BlueCore 01 is a single-chip radio and baseband IC for 2.4GHz Bluetooth radios, with an external Flash ROM containing the CSR Bluetooth software stack. The design is optimised to require very few external RF components to speed design of the motherboard, especially critical in the mobile phone arena, where products typically have a lifespan of three months. ®