Sunday, September 28, 2003

The Searchin' for Bluetooth Drivers Blues A reader who has been doing a considerable amount of research about an interesting form of DRM (Digital Rights Management) associated with Bluetooth drivers shares his findings: I recently purchased a Belkin Bluetooth USB adapter for my laptop. I'd bought one of those new Nokia 3650 phones with Bluetooth built in, and I thought it would be great to be able to do things like back up my phone's contact list, install applications, etc., just as easily as I do with my Palm Pilot. Well, the drivers that came out of the box have REAL issues with Windows XP, so I went to Belkin’s website and searched for drivers. Well, the drivers that they had were the same level as what came on the CD that came with the unit. Apparently USB Bluetooth adapters from Belkin, Dell (internal Bluetooth), TDK, 3COM, Billionton, PenBlue, Acer, AnyCom, GoalRay, and several others all use the same WidComm drivers and software. It seems that all that's different is the license file that's shipped with one set of drivers or another, and that that license file is generated on a per-build basis. So essentially, even if there are newer drivers out there that are KNOWN to fix your issues, you can't get them, because unless your manufacturer puts out a build of those drivers with a customized license file, you can't even install them. It's gotten so ridiculous that there are websites that discuss how to hack the btsec.dll file so that the driver package can be installed. Apparently, some (or all) of license.dat is INJECTED into btsec.dll as a code object that executes to validate your license when the stack is being loaded. I called up Belkin tech support, and asked them "What gives?" One tech support fellow said, "Yeah, we've got some newer drivers, but we're not posting them because we're discontinuing the unit, and we're introducing a new unit. The long and short of it is that I raised such a stink that they're taking the older unit back, and are going to send me the newer one (which is back-ordered for a month, thus far). This, however, doesn't help other folks who've already purchased this unit -- the Belkin F8T001 rev 1. (Apparently the same applies for the F8T003 rev 1, as well). The fact that WidComm implements this hokey form of DRM is a joke! I mean, what are you going to do with the drivers anyway, unless you actually HAVE a Bluetooth USB unit that the drivers recognize? I lay a little blame on Belkin for not making the newer drivers for their older units available (and I suspect they aren't the only OEM that's following suit), and in grander scale I blame WidComm for forcing the OEM's to follow this silly mechanism of coding "hardware specific license verification" into their drivers. So, if you're looking to go Bluetooth on your PC anytime soon ... get ready to sing the blues. 5:30:27 PM    comment []