Bluetooth can be something of a mystery to many of us. Unless you’re up to date with all the latest gadgetry or unless you’re a bit of a tech geek, you might only have a rough idea of what bluetooth is without really being too sure.
In short, it is a specific wireless protocol that enables two devices to talk to each other. The term “bluetooth” just refers to the protocol those devices actually use to communicate. If you’re a consumer that’s probably all you need to know from a technical standpoint.
So what happens when you have two devices that you want to talk to each other, but only one of them is bluetooth compatible? In that case you need to get a bluetooth dongle or bluetooth adaptor.
Note that these are not the same thing. A bluetooth dongle plugs into the USB port on your computer and then enables the computer to communicate using the bluetooth protocol. A bluetooth adaptor plugs into the audio out socket of an audio device, enabling the sound to be sent wirelessly to a bluetooth stereo headset for example.
Do you see the difference? Many people get confused by bluetooth dongles and bluetooth adaptors, buying one when what they are actually looking for is the other.
The best way to remember it is as follows. If you are sending data, you want a dongle, if you are sending audio, you need an adaptor. See what I did there? D=dongle=data. A=adaptor=audio.
Of course, in many instances you can actually use a dongle for transmitting audio as well as data. Say for example you are playing an iTunes playlist on your computer and you want to listen to the music on your bluetooth headset. A dongle would be fine in that instance, but you wouldn’t be able to connect it to your hifi for example.
So hopefully now you are a little bit better informed about when to use a bluetooth dongle and when to use a bluetooth adaptor.