A new report by Aislelabs looks at 16 different beacon hardware makers, including details like which chipsets they use and how long the batteries last when subjected to stress tests.…
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Retailers are excited about beacons, but how fast will they drain your smartphone battery?
Bluetooth Low Energy beacons can drain device battery life, according to a new study. But new Bluetooth chips and adaptive scanning techniques can cut the rate of battery usage.…
Read MoreHow your Chromebook could soon sync with a Bluetooth health tracker or smartwatch
Smartwatches and wearable health gadgets typically get or send data to the cloud via Bluetooth 4.0 to a mobile device. You could soon cut out the middleman thanks to Chrome OS host support for Bluetooth 4.0 LE.…
Read MoreMLB completes iBeacon installations at Dodger Stadium and Petco Park
The ballparks are the first two of more than 20 that will use Apple’s iBeacon technology by opening day of the 2014 season.…
Read MoreNokia’s Treasure Tags can help you find your keys
Nokia is planning to launch "Treasure Tags" for its Lumia Windows phones. These tags are Bluetooth and NFC-enabled proximity sensors that can help you find your lost keys via an augmented reality app.…
Read MoreLook out Nike Fuel band, UnderArmour’s fitness strap measures WILLPower!
Not to be outdone by Nike, UnderArmour has a new wearable exercise tracking strap. The Armour39 measures calories and heart rate, combining those with additional data to create your, ahem, WILLPower score.…
Read MoreMetaWatch smartwatch now smarter: supports iOS and Bluetooth 4
MetaWatch announced two key improvements for its smartwatch development platform in an effort to better compete with up-and-comer products. The MetaWatch now has support to get wireless data from iOS devices and also aims for better battery life with the addition of a Bluetooth 4.0 radio.…
Read MoreForget LTE — the real iPad wireless story is Bluetooth
Amid the various upgrades announced for Apple's new iPad was a hot new wireless technology. You might think I'm referring to the tablet's 4G LTE mobile broadband support, but I'm not. I'm talking about the far less sexy, but no less important, inclusion of Bluetooth 4.0.…
Read MoreFirst-look video: Wahoo Blue HR heart-rate monitor
This year is shaping up to be a good one for health-related gadgets, thanks to the new Bluetooth 4.0 specification and profiles. The $79 Wahoo Blue HR is among the first of these devices, and I recently took it for a 5-mile test run.…
Read MoreThe secret payload of the iPhone 4S: Bluetooth 4.0
People paid a lot of attention to two new features that arrived in the iPhone 4S: The much-improved camera and Siri, the new voice-powered digital assistant. But the 4S also snuck in another feature upgrade, one that's a ticking time bomb of potential goodness: Bluetooth 4.0.…
Read MoreMotorola chases the smart watch fitness market with MotoACTV
Motorola's big news was supposed to be the resurrection of the Razr brand with the Droid Razr but the manufacturer took people by surprise with a new fitness and music watch called MotoACTV that drops Motorola into a fast growing market for mobile fitness devices.…
Read MoreBluetooth 4.0 will create smarter medical devices
The Bluetooth standards body today added support for two specific data types in the Bluetooth 4.0 specification: the Health Thermometer Profile and the Heart Rate Profile. Both could help fuel a rise in the number of health-monitoring gadgets, expected to be a $9.3 billion industry by 2014.…
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