The Firefly Battery Powered Bluetooth module.

[pdablue]

Hi,

A company called GridConnect sells a battery powered Bluetooth
module called the Firefly. View the pictures below.

The Firefly Bluetooth module is enclosed in a plastic case that has a
battery compartment for 2 AAA batteries. The Firefly has a 9-pin D-Shell
connector, 4 externally accessable dip switches, a Power On/Off button
and a Power Jack connector.

The datasheet says the 2 AAA batteries can power the Firefly for about
10 hours. It seems that the batteries must be in the battery compartment
when using an external power adapter with the Firefly. I am using
rechargeable Nickel Metal Hydride batteries in my Firefly. The rechargeable
AAA batteries can be purchase in a 4-pack and be charged up quickly in a
1 hour charger.

The output signals on the 9-pin D-Shell connector are at RS-232 signal
levels and an RS-232 interface chip is required to get the signals back
to TTL/CMOS levels when interfacing to embedded hardware designs.

I have used Basic4PPC to write programs that can send ASCII data
to the Firefly across a Bluetooth link using an HP IPAQ H2210 PDA and
the HP IPAQ 210 VGA PDA.

The Firefly is one of the cheapest battery powered Bluetooth modules
that I could find for sale on the Internet.