Bluetooth activesync consistency troubles

[JGRicci]

Ok, so i recently got a widcomm bluetooth dongle for my desktop/laptop so i can start bluetooth syncing/sharing with it. I have a new Hp 4150 PPC.

I've had one -hell- of a time getting it to work consistently! I'm sure most of you who have tried bluetooth syncing are aware of the troubles it has.
My biggest problem is getting activesync to believe that the Com port IS available. I always get the message "Com port is NOT available" under the 'connection settings' menu.

So.. when i do the 'get connected' and it scans the COM ports, it doesn't find my device, but then when i leave that, the connection settings menu says 'com port IS available!' and I'll try and connect with my hp4150 and no activesync connection is made. I'll mess around with that a couple more times and then finally it connects and all is well in the world.

The problem comes when i reboot my desktopPC, upon restart i get a message saying activesync cann't open the COM port, would you like to retry? And then it just asks to disable the COM port. And i have to go through the whole close my eyes-and-fire-away approach to getting the bluetooth sync up to work. I can't get it to work consistently! Any pointers? Or should i just wait for future activesync releases that have buletooth support built in?


---Justin ricci

[Kevin Remhof]

I've seen the same thing but not quite as severe. Here's what I've found:

I bought a Bluetooth dongle last week to use with my iPAQ 1945. If I remove the dongle and reboot, I'll get the "can't open COM port" message. It goes away if I reconnect the dongle or plug in my iPAQ with a USB cable.

My thought is that ActiveSync can't handle having a disconnected COM port. You can get past the message (by using another method to sync such as USB). But, that's about it.

I was getting this at work and ending up turning off the "Allow serial cable... to this COM port" since I don't have the dongle there anymore.

You might want to check out some of the Bluetooth guides:

http://www.geekzone.co.nz/content.asp?ContentId=449
http://home.comcast.net/~spam-target/

Bluetooth is good but can be a bit flaky to get working reliably. My biggest gripe is that my firewall app (ZoneAlarm Free) doesn't support Internet Connection Sharing without changing the firewall settings. No big deal though for me. I can surf the net using the ActiveSync Bluetooth connection.