The next generation of Bluetooth technology will be officially unveiled at the end of this month, according to the Bluetooth Special Interest Group, the official body for Bluetooth standards.
The main improvement on the current Bluetooth standard is that this new version will be incredibly fast – allowing for the transfer of entire of media files, including video and photos, in seconds.
This will perhaps bring Bluetooth to the attention of the general public and place it on a par with Wi-Fi, instead of it being used to simply pair phones with wireless headsets.
In fact, Bluetooth 3.0 will work in conjunction with Wi-Fi, thanks to the 802.11 Protocol Adaption Layer. So two Bluetooth 3.0 devices will be able to connect over Wi-Fi for super-fast speeds, and should Wi-Fi coverage drop, data transfer will switch seamlessly back to Bluetooth alone.
The Enhanced Power Control addition will also allow for stronger connections, making Bluetooth 3.0 a more robust pairing technology.
For now, this is as much as we can know about Bluetooth 3.0, but the 21 April announcement from the Bluetooth SIG will give us a full, detailed specification for the new standard.
By Marie Boran
