Section 65. Pair Up with a Bluetooth Headset or Car Kit


65. Pair Up with a Bluetooth Headset or Car Kit

BEFORE YOU BEGIN

64 Turn Bluetooth On and Off


SEE ALSO

55 Make and Receive Phone Calls

66 Tweak Bluetooth Options

67 About Bluetooth Security


Bluetooth can dramatically change the manner in which you use your BlackBerry 7100 series device. For example, a Bluetooth hands-free car kit allows you to leave your device in a briefcase, purse, console, or glove box while carrying on a conversation wirelessly . Similarly, a Bluetooth headset enables you to use a discrete wireless earpiece to carry on a conversation while your BlackBerry device is tucked safely away in a pocket. Thanks to the relative simplicity of Bluetooth technology, you can easily connect a Bluetooth headset or hands-free car kit to your BlackBerry device with minimal effort and then repeatedly connect it from then on with no effort. This effectively makes a Bluetooth headset or hands-free car kit even easier to use than their wired counterparts.

65. Pair Up with a Bluetooth Headset or Car Kit


1.
Open the Tools Screen

Scroll to the Tools icon on the Home screen and click the trackwheel. The Tools screen appears, showing a list of tool options.

2.
Open the Settings Screen

Scroll to the Settings icon and click the trackwheel. A list of options for which you can change the settings appears.

3.
Open the Bluetooth Screen

Scroll to the Bluetooth option in the list of settings and click the trackwheel. The Bluetooth screen opens.

4.
Add the Headset or Car Kit As a New Device

To pair up your BlackBerry device with a Bluetooth headset or hands-free car kit, you must first add the headset or car kit to your BlackBerry device so your device knows about it. For the purposes of this task, I'm going to focus on adding and connecting to a Bluetooth headset, although the same process applies to a hands-free car kit.

NOTE

Although I refer to a hands-free car kit several times throughout this task, you might run across other kinds of hands-free Bluetooth devices, such as a portable hands-free device that doesn't necessarily have to be used in an automobile. However, for the sake of keeping the distinction obvious, I refer to a hands-free car kit as the hands-free alternative to a headset. All these devices basically serve the same purpose, so there isn't any real reason to distinguish between them.

Before adding the headset to your BlackBerry device, you must first turn on the headset and enable it for being discovered by your device. This enabling process is unique to your particular headset. I use a Motorola HS820 headset, which requires me to hold down its multifunction (power) button for 5 seconds to make it discoverable. When your headset is powered on and ready for discovery, you can proceed with adding the headset to your device.

To add a headset to your device, click the trackwheel and select Add Device from the menu that appears. Click again, and your BlackBerry device begins searching for available Bluetooth devices to add. After finding the headset, your BlackBerry device prompts you to select the headset for addition.

TIP

If your BlackBerry device doesn't find the headset, first check to ensure that Bluetooth is enabled on your device; see 64 Turn Bluetooth On and Off . If Bluetooth is already enabled on your device, double-check that you have properly set the headset so it can be discovered. On my Motorola headset, it took a few tries before I realized how long the multifunction button had to be held down before it entered "discovery" mode. If, for some reason, your BlackBerry device locks up while searching for a Bluetooth device, perform a soft reset by removing the battery and reinserting it.

5.
Select the New Device

After successfully locating a new Bluetooth device, your BlackBerry device displays a dialog box showing the Bluetooth headset. Click the name of the headset to accept it as a new Bluetooth device.

6.
Enter the Passkey for the New Device

Every Bluetooth device has an associated passkey , which serves as a PIN code that is required for your BlackBerry device to pair up with the Bluetooth device. In the case of peripheral devices such as headsets that don't really have security implications, the passkey is typically just 0000 . Enter the passkey for your headset and click the trackwheel.

KEY TERM

Passkey A short password similar to a PIN code used to gain access to a Bluetooth device. Most Bluetooth peripherals have a default passkey of 0000 .

NOTE

If you are unsure of the passkey for your headset, refer to the headset manual. If you're the kind of person who avoids reading manuals at all costs, give 0000 a try; this is the passkey typically used for most Bluetooth headsets and hands-free car kits.

After successfully entering the passkey for the headset, the headset is added to the Bluetooth device list where you can now connect to it for wireless telephony communications.

7.
Connect to the Headset or Car Kit

To connect to the Bluetooth headset from your BlackBerry device, click the trackwheel and select Connect from the menu that appears. Click again and your device connects to the headset. Try checking your voice mail (hold down the E R key in the Phone application) or making a phone call to confirm that the headset works; see 55 Make and Receive Phone Calls .

TIP

If you have difficulty connecting to your headset, make sure that it is turned on and within range of your BlackBerry device. This means the headset should be no further than 32 feet (10 meters ) from your device. If you still can't connect, try going outside to avoid any radio interference from other electronic devices that might be causing problems indoors.

NOTE

Unfortunately, the BlackBerry 7100 series devices don't support voice dialing, which means you still have to access your phone to dialeven if you have a hands-free car kit. It's really unfortunate that RIM didn't include voice dialing in the 7100 series devices because it is necessary to truly get the most out of hands-free Bluetooth accessories.

If your Bluetooth headset isn't automatically activated after being connected, you can easily activate it during a phone call by clicking the trackwheel, selecting Activate Device Name from the menu that appears, and clicking again. In fact, you use this same approach to select between the handset, speakerphone, and any Bluetooth headsets or hands-free car kits connected to your BlackBerry device.

TIP

Using your BlackBerry device, you can configure a Bluetooth headset or hands-free car kit so it automatically connects with your device when they get within range of each other; see 66 Tweak Bluetooth Options to find out how to configure this setting.




BlackBerry in a Snap
BlackBerry in a Snap
ISBN: 0672326701
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2005
Pages: 149

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