Bluetooth Headphone Headache - Updated Post

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  Originally uploaded by MobileBurn.

I've had four different bluetooth headphones and paired them with four different phones, roughly sixteen different pairings.

I even bought the treo branded headphone specifically to pair with my treo when I was using that phone.

I've tried everything to make these things work reliably.

And I can't get them to pair reliably and stay paired.

I feel like an idiot with a bluetooth headphone in one ear and my phone held up to the other ear and it happens to me all the time.

What I want to know is if this is how bluetooth is supposed to work or if there's some secret I don't know to make it work for me.

I am all ears and waiting for your thoughts in the comments.

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I wrote that post on my blackberry sitting on the runway waiting to take off. It was a bit rushed. And the comments I've gotten so far, while helpful, indicate that I missed my point.

I have tried various bluetooth headphones with the Treo, the Blackberry (which I currently use), the Sidekick, and a windows mobile phone. I've never had a good experience.

The comments I've gotten so far indicate it is the phone. I am currently using a blackberry. Does anyone have a good suggestion for a bluetooth headphone for my Blackberry 8700?

Comments

[Jonathan Greene]

I think it's the Treo. My Nokia phones actually reconnect even after the connection breaks due to distance. My Treo would require a manual reconnection more than once right after trying to pair.

[Greg]

It's almost certainly down to poor implementation on the handset side. Not sure you want this level of detail but:

1. BT is a master-slave networking protocol; handset as master, headphone as slave.

2. Handset advertisizes over the air that it offers a particular application to other BT devices that may be listening.

3. Headphone notices advertising, initiates connection. Various handshaking occurs, session begins.

That's how its supposed to work--but BT itself is just a networking protocol, and actually implementing advertisement/subscription and renewal of connection if it gets lost is 100% up to the developer. So if they do a poor job of, say, detecting loss of signal and attempting a reconnection, then you're screwed.

I have no experience with Treo's BT implementation, but Jonathan's suggestion that it's the Treo's fault sounds plausible to me.

[Matt Howell]

I have the 700w and pretty much gave up on the whole BT headset / BT desktop sync for the same reasons you just mentioned. I constantly find myself having to go back into the BT settings and "enabling" the headset service. My old Blackberry never had these problems.

[fewquid]

FWIW... I was an early adopter of bluetooth headsets, back when Sony Ericsson still made handsets that worked worth a damn in the USA. Even with a v1.0 Jabra headset and a v1.0 BT phone, I never had the problems you are experiencing. Since the only constant through all of your trevails is the Treo, I'd have to point the finger squarely at that...

[cfw]

I just want to see photos or video of fw feeling like an idiot "with a bluetooth headphone in one ear and [his] phone held up to the other ear." What we out up with to test the latest gadgets!

[Ivan Ivanov]

Based on my experience, there is only one wining combination of a phone and an earpiece and that is Nokia 6310i phone and Motorla H500 earpiece. Don’t be fooled by the older shape of this phone. As far as I know that is the only phone that performs as a real business phone – 14 days standby with single recharge, perfect connection with the earpiece without periodical manual reconnect, and the menu… wow! Whoever has designed the menu on this phone obviously knew something about the use of a phone in the real world. As in many other phones it comes with a lot of options that most likely you will never use, but luckily they are not the default options as they are in many other phones.
I used this phone for more that 4 years in many countries on three continents and it worked everywhere without any additional setup or changes. It is still performing perfectly.
About a year ago I was tempted to buy a new Motorola Razr. That was a really stupid move! Hands down, this is the worst phone I have ever used. It looks nice. It supposedly has everything that one could think of and yet it is unusable. This phone, as many others of the newest generation requires your full attention. It barely holds one full day on standby and if you are talking more that twice a day, better carry a charger with you. The menu is semi-reprogrammable and probably that is the reason why it is completely obscure and useless. This would be more than enough to throw it away but there is more… Now the funny part – the Motorola earpiece is equipped with volume controls. One might consider this as a valuable feature but guess what – these controls do not work with the Motorola Razr. However, the volume control works perfectly with Nokia. Perhaps, the Nokia engineers have red more carefully the specifications of the Motorola earpiece or that feature is conveniently turned off and buried somewhere in the Razr’s menu and I haven’t found it yet.

[W. Ian Blanton]

I've had good luck with my Plantronics Voyager 510, and my Blackberry 7520.

I sometimes get the drop out issue, but usually it's because I left my phone sitting somewhere and wandered off with the headset, or vice versa.

[Hank Rearden]

we love the plantronics 510. use it with blackberry's and motorola q in our office. seems to be the best.

[Adam Kalsey]

I've got the previous generation BlackBerry phone, the 7100. I initially bought the Logitech Mobile Freedom headset because of the price, talk time, and wind-resistant microphone.

I never had the pairing problems I heard about from everyone else. I paired it to my laptop and my Blackberry. Sure it was a little bulky, but it worked great.

For 10 months.

Then the battery stopped holding a charge and fed up with trying to get Logitech support to actually deal with the problem I bought a Jabra BT500.

It's okay, at best.

The signal sucks and if the phone isn't a few feet away in a direct line of sight, static creeps in. I can't even have the phone on my desk to my left with the headset on my right ear without getting static.

Even when there's no static, some calls suck. There's an occaisional lag time between the headset and the caller on the other end.

Pairing with the phone and the laptop at the same time appears impossible. If I pair with the laptop, I have to re-pair with the phone, then the laptop connection won't work.

The easily-pressed multifunction button redials the last number I spoke to, even if the phone is locked. Don't put the headset in your pocket without turning it off first or your friends will have a nice conversation with your keys.

So, it's possibly a combination of two things -- the phone and the headset. Seems that you need the perfect pair in order to be happy.

[Ari Newman]

The blackberry bluetooth implementation is known to be a bit sketchy. Their implementation is dated (the older version of the protocol?), and do not support many of the features available with the newer spec and newer headsets.
That said, I had terrible performance with a Jabra BT800 and my BB 7100. The Motorola H500 performed pretty well with the BB. Answering and terminating calls worked reliably, and the phone/headset stayed paired ok.

[Jim Griffin]

Try a Nokia E61 -- order it over eBay or gray market import it from outside the US.

It's like a Blackberry in many ways, but does so much more. Streaming stereo audio, video, etc. E-mail, web browser, etc.

Key feature: It uses WiFi in addition to quad-band GSM.

And because it includes WiFi, neither Cingular nor TMobile will import it. But you can use it by slipping one of their SIM chips into it.

Nokia is putting free WiFi into ten big NYC parks next month, and it will only add to the value of the WiFi.

This is one great device.

[Nick Givotovsky]

Welcome to the shortcomings of bluetooth interoperability in practice, rather than in principle.

I believe new devices and services should come with interoperability ratings, and ideally the actual contact info of the team that validated that a device in question conformed to a given spec. Bluetooth headsets have had a mixed record at best for me as well. I also have, under the heading of stuff that should work but just doesn't, an aiport express that cowers in fear from the netgear wifi router I also run. The upshot of this being that when itunes is doing it's thing and streaming to ye olde hifi, the aiprort express balks and runs for cover based on some form of intimidation it may be recieving from the netgear device. or it could be afaraid of the fan, no easy way to tell. Also, Skype and optonline should play together a lot better I think... which leads me to the not so dazzling insight that...maybe they don't want to work togther nicely - but more importantly, how was that golden smog concert anyway?

[P-Air]

Fred, not sure what to tell you but I too use the Crackberry 8700 and the Motorola Bluetooth Headset HS850 that I've been using has worked most of the time. Only occasionally does it not get recognized after a charge, but nothing that closing it and re-opening it doesn't fix. Sounds quality has also been good for me. I use it primarily in the SF Bay Area.

[Jackson]

Bluetooth....sounds like something you get from eating Blackberries.

[Peter Bowen]

I use the Plantronics 320 with my Treo and VOIP on my PC. I get great range, I have no problem using the PC or phone, and switching back and forth has not been a problem either. The earpiece has a full day of talk time (8 hours), so I don't have to worry about carrying around the charger. It is the cheapest Plantronics set, so I have no idea why it works so well - but it does. So... it may not be your phone, it may be the headset.

[YB]

Fred,
I just went thru the same ordeal...I have the Blackberry 8700 which is a great device...but the complaint has been the audio quality...I dreamed that there could be a way be to combine the quality of the Blackberry device with the audio quality of Nokia's phones...well now there is!!! With Nokia's new Bluetooth earphone...the BH-800, it's a clever design, fantastic quality, amazing accessory. Finally found the perfect bluetooth. Check it out.

[David J. Whelan]

Fred, you just described my life: “I feel like an idiot with a bluetooth headphone in one ear and my phone held up to the other ear and it happens to me all the time.”

I have the fantastic and elegantly designed Plantronics Discovery 640 (which has been replaced by the 645, which in turn has been rebranded as the Palm Ultralight Wireless Headset), which worked like a charm with the Treo 650.

With the 700p, I have been having a really hard time making the pairing stick. Sometimes it works. Most of the time, it doesn’t. It has been so flaky that I have stopped using it. I am convinced that it is a problem with the Treo, but I haven’t had a chance to try swapping it for another one. Perhaps a firmware update is in the works.

I believe in the promise of Bluetooth. But I think we’re not quite there yet....