As a trendy tech enthusiast, there are several products in life that enhance personal style: Bluetooth headsets, Bluetooth mice, Bluetooth speakers, smart wristbands… Just buying one, even if you haven’t started using it, will make you feel like your life has instantly leveled up, and your tech attributes have skyrocketed.
A Bluetooth tampon produced by a foreign company,
You decide if it’s geeky or not | my.Flow
We are all too familiar with the term Bluetooth. However, if you keep saying Bluetooth and using Bluetooth, what exactly is Bluetooth?
This story begins with a Danish king.
Bluetooth is actually a short-range wireless communication technology, a global open standard for voice and data wireless transmission. But why is Bluetooth so ‘blue’? This traces back to the 10th-century Danish King Harald Blåtand (Harald Bluetooth). King Harald ruled Denmark from around 958 to 986. He was a fierce warrior who ended the Viking Age and unified the vast Nordic regions of present-day Norway, Sweden, and Denmark.
King Harald Blåtand | Wikipedia
The Danish word Blåtand translates to Bluetooth in English, hence this king is also known as King Harald Bluetooth. There are many versions regarding the origin of this name; one legend suggests that the king loved eating blueberries, which stained his teeth blue; some historians speculate that one of the king’s teeth decayed, giving it a blue appearance.
In 1996, Ericsson, Nokia, Toshiba, IBM, and Intel planned to establish an industry association to jointly develop a short-range wireless connection technology. The development team hoped this wireless communication technology could coordinate and unify the work across different industrial fields, just like King Bluetooth. Therefore, this technology was named Bluetooth. The Bluetooth logo is a combination of the ancient Nordic letters ᚼ and ᛒ, which represent the initials HB of King Harald Blåtand. Thanks to this magical logo, the story of this Danish king has truly become legendary.
The meaning of the Bluetooth logo
Why should I use Bluetooth when I have WiFi?
As both are short-range communication technologies, Bluetooth inevitably gets compared to WiFi technology. So what are the differences between them?
Bluetooth and WiFi are often compared
First, in terms of usage, we often connect multiple devices to the same WiFi to access the internet, which is a one-to-many connection, whereas Bluetooth involves data transmission between two devices, which is a point-to-point connection. From this perspective, Bluetooth has a higher data security.
Secondly, Bluetooth uses microstrip antennas, which are small and convenient to integrate into devices, and Bluetooth modules are very low-cost, leading to a high penetration rate of Bluetooth devices; however, WiFi devices require separate network cards and router equipment, which are expensive and consume more power.
In some scenarios, Bluetooth is more suitable than WiFi. For example, friends in Shanghai often use an app called Metro when taking the subway.
Image | Shanghai Metro
To protect passenger property security and prevent QR codes from being scanned maliciously, this app requires users to turn on Bluetooth to allow the gate and phone to verify each other; only after verification will the gate open. If this app used the internet or WiFi for authentication, poor network conditions could affect passengers’ ability to enter or exit the gate. In this case, using Bluetooth for secure authentication is a more appropriate solution.
Does turning on Bluetooth consume a lot of power?
However, if you have to keep Bluetooth on just to take the subway, will it drain your phone’s battery quickly? To understand this issue, you need to know about the new advancements in Bluetooth technology.
Currently, we use two types of Bluetooth: traditional Bluetooth and BLE (Bluetooth Low Energy). Traditional Bluetooth uses a point-to-point communication method, which is a persistent connection scheme typically used in scenarios with larger data volumes, such as Bluetooth headsets and audio devices.
Listening to music with Bluetooth headphones relies on traditional Bluetooth connection | 东方IC
BLE is a low-energy Bluetooth technology. Compared to traditional Bluetooth, the biggest advantage of BLE is its very fast search and connection speed, and low power consumption. BLE can establish a connection (scanning devices, establishing connection, sending data, etc.) in about 3ms, and after completing the task, it quickly switches to a ‘non-connection’ state, minimizing power consumption. However, BLE has a physical bandwidth of only 1M and a low data transmission rate, so BLE is generally used for devices that require high real-time performance but have very small data packets, such as keyboards and remote controls.
Low-energy Bluetooth technology is generally used for devices like Bluetooth keyboards | 东方IC
Using the ‘Metro’ app as an example, this app utilizes BLE technology. When passengers pass through the gate, the software can quickly establish a connection with the gate and complete authentication via BLE. This process is almost imperceptible to passengers and does not increase their waiting time at the gate. Furthermore, due to the use of BLE technology, Metro only needs to send a very small data packet to the gate; after authentication is completed, Bluetooth quickly enters a ‘non-connection’ state, significantly reducing power consumption, making the power drained negligible for the phone.
It passes by in a flash | 东方IC
Whether for commuting, listening to music on the subway, or wireless office work, the use of Bluetooth technology has made our lives more convenient. The next time you turn on Bluetooth, don’t forget to thank that engineering romance from the Nordic countries, and that distant Danish king from the Viking era.
References
[1]https://gizmodo.com/bluetooth-is-named-after-a-medieval-king-who-may-have-h-1671450657
[2]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harald_Bluetooth
Author: 半之
Editor: 大琳砸
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