Windows Phone Thoughts: Dell Axim X3i - Now With Added Bluetooth

Following this process creates a connection shortcut, which can be seen in Figure 10. So long as you follow the instructions, you will have ActiveSync working over Bluetooth without any problems - it certainly worked the first time for me! The principle difference between using ActiveSync over Bluetooth and over USB is that in the case of Bluetooth, you have to initiate the synchronisation from the device. To do this on the Axim, you tap and hold on the ActiveSync shortcut and then choose the Connect option. If you look closely, you'll see that the ActiveSync shortcut is shown in green - this indicates that the shortcut is an active connection.


Figure 10: Bluetooth shortcuts.

The other connections work in a very similar manner - follow some instructions, find a suitable device, make the connection. The wizard really does make light work of getting your Axim to talk to other BT devices.


Figure 11: Browsing files over a Bluetooth connection.

Figure 11 shows the Bluetooth file browsing process from the viewpoint of the Pocket PC. This particular screenshot shows the files being exported by my laptop. As you can see, you can receive a file or delete it, send a file or create a folder. One thing to note about transferring files in this manner is that because you aren't using ActiveSync, the normal file conversion process is bypassed.

The headset connection worked, whereby a headset replaces the speaker & microphone on the Pocket PC, but it does need to be remembered that Bluetooth currently only supports a mono device and doesn't have enough bandwidth to make even the mono stream sound that brilliant.

The creation of the Bluetooth personal network connection worked … in that both my laptop and my Axim have IP addresses, and they could ping each other (with an average round trip time of 53ms). However, I couldn't get the Axim's file explorer to browse my laptop via that network connection. There is very little documentation about the personal network service so I'm not really sure how this is supposed to be used between, say, a Pocket PC and a Windows XP laptop.

Business Card Exchange gives you the option of sending a business card, exchanging business cards or requesting a business card, as shown in Figure 12. The first two options are only available if you have either selected or entered your business card details in the Information Exchange service screen. Tapping either of the options brings up the Bluetooth Browser, as shown in Figure 13. The user interface on this screen is a bit confusing, though, compared with the other Wizard screens. Here, you have to select the one or more recipients and then click on the OK button at the top of the screen.


Figure 12: Business card exchange options.


Figure 13: Browsing available devices.

I did hit some problems using this feature, but only with devices that had previously been paired with my Axim and had, during the process of testing, been subsequently unpaired. When I used this feature with a mobile phone that hadn't seen my device before, I successfully sent & received contact information.

The final wizard option - explore a Bluetooth device - allows you to select a specific device, see what services are being offered by that device and then create a shortcut to that device for the selected services.