Customer Reviews

Kensington K33902US Bluetooth USB Micro Adapter

5 star:		(60)
4 star:		(27)
3 star:		(11)
2 star:		(5)
1 star:		(9)

 

 

The unit works well with any devices that I personally have paired it with ie. cell phones, headsets, stereo headsets, and another computer.

However, when the radio is on when you turn the computer on, there are 2 processes TOSOBEX.EX and SERVICES.EXE that will take up most if not all your CPU cycle. This slows down the computer very much. This happens even when there are no devices paired with the unit.

I have installed the unit on 2 other machines with the same results. So, somehow the Toshiba Stack that comes with this unit takes up CPU cycles when the bluetooth radio is turned on. This happens on my laptop and 2 desktops.

Once those services are on, there is no way to turn it off except to reboot the machine. However, PRIOR to rebooting the machine, TURN the bluetooth radio off first. That way when the computer is rebooted, those services will not be on.

The one workaround that I did was to RENAME the TOSOBEX.EXE file to something else like BAD_TOSOBEX.EXE_BAD. That way it won't get invoked when you turn the bluetooth radio on. That means that you WILL NOT have OBEX capability.

Kensington Techincal Support so far has been USELESS. But, I'm still trying to get to people there who actually know what they are talking about.

Also, on the cosmetic side, the unit has VERY SHARP corners. Be careful when you are handling your laptop (if you are using it on a laptop); I have been scratched multiple times by its corners.

I have no problem with the hardware, but the Toshiba drivers that come with the device significantly limit its capabilities. Some parts of the software, like Skype integration, are over-engineered. As a result, I could not get Skype to work with this product (perhaps a compatibility issue with the latest Skype release, but I could not find a compatible version or one that was not recognized by Toshiba's drivers -- should have worked fine if the drivers just didn't try to do anything special). There are other peculiarities, like having to forever use the same USB port as the one used during the installation.

I highly recommend considering a similar device based on a Broadcom chipset (sometimes referred to as coming with WIDCOMM drivers).

This device works as advertised for my purpose, which is to connect my Samsung Hue via BitPim. I've used the adapter on two systems (both running XP SP3), and it works flawlessly, installing the native XP drivers (no need to install the much more resource-intensive application that ships with the adapter). No hassle at all: switch on the Hue's Bluetooth discovery mode, switch the PC Connection setting to Bluetooth, and the devices communicate without a problem. Then, when you're not using it, just disable the radio in the device manager. In neither case (on my desktop nor laptop) did the native XP Bluetooth drivers consume unreasonable resources. It just works.

Made the mistake of following the directions, inserting the CD and going through the install process - which ended in saying that it wasn't compatible with this version of Windows (Windows 7). Uninstalled the software and then just put the blue tooth device in the USB slot and Win 7 installed the driver and software needed in a minute or so. It wouldn't connect with my Palm Tungsten E2 at first then I realized I hadn't changed the settings on my computer to allow the device to be "discoverable." Once I did that everything worked great. I'm happy with this device since my Palm Tungsten E2 is not able to sync with Windows 7 64-bit through the USB cable I've always used. Now I can still keep my E2 and sync without the cable. Nice!

I bought this item so I could sync my PALM TX with a 64-bit Vista PC. Previously, I used a USB cable to sync my TX with my PC, but when I purchased a 64-bit machine, the cable sync no longer worked. The USB blue tooth device works great.

I purchased this device mostly for listening to music. The size is very impressive as its about the size of a penny. Unfortunately the range is also very small, about ten feet from the device and the music starts cutting out.

This device does not work in windows 7. I was trying to pair my brand new HP 2160US laptop (why it does not have bluetooth on board I don't know) with my iPhone. This is not a terribly crazy configuration -- to pair an iPhone with a new HP laptop. Here is the deal:

1. Don't use the CD that comes with it. It is meant for XP and Vista OS. If you load it up in Windows 7 you get a "known compatibility issues statement". I uninstalled.
2. I then rebooted and simply plugged in the device. The standard MS drivers found the iPhone but there was an issue that places a big exclaimation point on the device saying that it "needs attention". Selecting that notification shows it as having issues with "no device driver loaded".
3. Kensington tech support was not there until 7:30 pacific time. When they finally answered, it was India. Why in the world would they wait until 7:30 pacific if their call center is in India is beyond me. Wouldn't you want them to be available at 8:00 eastern through 5:00pm pacific. Unbelievable.
4. When they took my call, they were useless. They actually told me that the problem must be the iPhone (3GS), not the Toshiba stack that is documented all over the web as having issues. Classic finger pointing by support.
5. After 35 minutes, I boxed it up and sent it back to Amazon.

DO NOT BUY THIS IF YOU ARE RUNNING Win7. ALL THE GOOD REVIEWS ARE FOR FOLKS RUNNING XP & VISTA!!!!!

Like many, had to buy this to sync Palm Centro now using Windows 7. Agree with not using included CD--plug in and let Windows install. For me, I had to do another step to get my Centro to sync, and that was to download an updated Palm Desktop application from Palm. I would recommend going here and following these steps to make this work:
[...]

This Bluetooth USB Micro Adapter, will not work with Windows 7. I found this out only after I tried to install the enclosed driver. Unfortunately, their is NO mention of this in the description of this device.

It works like a charm. For those of you with windows 7, dont install the CD. Simply just plug it in and windows will install the correct drivers and do the rest. Save yourself some trouble and enjoy.