Bluetooth Audio Transmitters/Receivers

Eek.

There's been discussion around here before regarding audio and Bluetooth. Range is going to be a concern. Also, even though it's Internet audio on YouTube, the sample with the RØDE VideoMic transmitted over these little devices sounded pretty poor... it loses some dynamic range, especially in the highs.

I just don't see this as a really viable solution. And there's no way that a $35 Bluetooth TX/RX set can replace a professional radio mic system.
 
Alex H. said:
Eek.

There's been discussion around here before regarding audio and Bluetooth. Range is going to be a concern. Also, even though it's Internet audio on YouTube, the sample with the RØDE VideoMic transmitted over these little devices sounded pretty poor... it loses some dynamic range, especially in the highs.

I just don't see this as a really viable solution. And there's no way that a $35 Bluetooth TX/RX set can replace a professional radio mic system.
Click to expand...
Thanks for the information, Alex.

What are your thoughts on using it with headphones via a recorder?
 
KyranFord said:
I don't know if this has already been posted or not, but I ran a search and didn't see anything. I'm sure some of you already know about this, but I'm mainly posting this because of the prices.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&v=3fVhRwtWVSY&NR=1

http://www.dslrfilmnoob.com/2011/03/20/35-wireless-bluetooth-setup-works-great/

I can't wait to give this a try. I'd love to hear others' thoughts.
Click to expand...

The 'pro' equipment operates down in the 700 and below frequencies. While there is interference, and the like, it is 'far less' than in the 2.4 GHz band where Bluetooth normally lives, which competes with WIFI, Microwaves, cordless phones, and other types of emitters. Human 'hearing' may accept packet loss, and only be perceived as 'degraded' with a 'large' level of loss. In the digital world, any uncorrrected packet loss will feed into audio alignment issues down the road, if recording for syncing with video. Hence for many digital systems there's a need to add forward error correction, which adds to the bandwidth required, as well as the sophistication of the hardware implementation (i.e. not typically available at popular prices...).

This holds true for video monitoring, which if just used for confirmation viewing, some small loss may be acceptable... but not for recording.

There may be 'pro' equipment in the 2.4 or 5 GHz bands... but I doubt it would be 'cheap', and perhaps the only reason I could see a company going that route is to avoid having deal with end user 'licensing/spectrum allocations' for the other bands. They still have to get their equipment certified by the FCC for emissions requirement, etc. but once that's done the use of the these bands is 'ok' every where...
 
Several years ago an australian manufacturer (not Rode) was working on a bluetooth wireless system what would actually work as a professional wireless system, and in the end it just wouldn't work well. It didn't sound good enough. The range is terrible (that's the main killer), and to do it right cost too much. The thing with these things in the video is this isn't going to replace your Lectro system or Sennheiser G3 system. Will it power a lav? If so, can I have different connectors put on that little cable? You can't use this as an IFB on something other than an ENG shoot where everyone is within a few feet from each other. Blue Tooth just doesn't have the range. Plus, it's just not reliable enough. I've had my blue tooth devices fail on me more times than I care to count, which is why I avoid them as much as I can. It's a cool toy to mess with since it is so cheap, but if I were on a job where I was getting paid, I don't know if I'd rely on these.
 
My experience with BT for audio is that frequency stability is terrible -- whether due to the buffering, or the compression scheme, I find there's a lot of wow in the output. Maybe it's just the kit I've been using, but I've given up on using BT to play music -- I can't stand it going from normal to flat and back all the time.
 
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