A friend of mine bought this device with the purpose of connecting his Sony-Erricson T610 mobile phone with his laptop. He needed a simple solution to transfer pictures from the phone to the laptop and the other way around. Well, it turns out it wasn't all that simple after all.

The box

The D-Link DBT-120 comes in a very large box (6.6in x 10in x 1in) considering the size of the adapter. Adapter is very small and it measures 1.81 in. in length, width is 0.73 in. and height is 0.37 in. Besides the adapter the box contains an USB extension cable, multilanguage installation guide and CD with the drivers and software. The inclusion of the USB extension cable is a good thing especially for someone whose computer doesn't have easy access to USB ports.

Installation

The installation procedure seems straightforward and easy to follow. It is important to follow the instructions which say that the drivers and software should be installed before the adapter is plugged in the USB port. The installation includes only a few simple steps but my friend wasn't able to finish it properly at which point he called me to help. After some time I realized that the he did everything right but the device refused to work properly. The computer didn't want to start the desktop application even though the device manager listed all the necessary drivers and reported that all the listed devices worked properly. We even managed to transfer a file to the phone but the communication from the phone to the desktop wasn't successful.

I was forced to read the manual on the CD, which as you know is the last thing one does. But that didn't help since no information concerning this type of problem was included. Then I logged on to the internet and found the necessary explanation on the D-Link support page. Basically it is a problem with Windows XP Service Pack 2 and it is required to manually install the proper drivers. The procedure is explained thoroughly in the file which you can
download here: ftp://ftp.dlink.com/Wireless/dbt120_revB4/QIG/WinXP_ServicePack2/dbt120_InstallationGuide_winxpsp2.pdf After that the application started to work and properly recognized the phone.

Software and usage

The D-link web site states: The D-Link DBT-120 includes Bluetooth management and connectivity software by WidComm, which enables you to configure and access Bluetooth enabled devices quickly and easily. The Bluetooth software enables your computer to discover and access available Bluetooth services ranging from Internet access to wireless synchronization with your PDA or cellular phone.
Generaly I found that this is true. After problems with installation I found that the DBT-120 works well but not perfect. Bluetooth is a form of wirelless networking and so it is required to type the connection code every time the PC and phone are "paired" or connected. My friend and I spent the better part of the afternoon playing with various setups and in that time the connection was broken only once with no apparent reason. The maximum range is about 10 meters (30 feet) which is consistent with the bluetooth advertised specification. One time we decided to disengage bluetooth on the phone without first stopping the device in windows. This caused the software to become "confused" as it continued to report the phone as connected but none of the services worked.

The application creates My Bluetooth icon in My Computer folder which works much like My Network Places. Also there is a tray icon which enables easy access to all of the functions like file transfer, synchronization or modem.

Also, there is a second tray icon which enables easy access to the bluetooth settings in the device manager. I find this confusing since the two icons look almost identical so it is easy to confuse them and click on the wrong one.

More information

For more information visit the D-Link page http://www.dlink.com/products/?pid=34. The page is very good with a lot of information. One more thing to note is that this adapter can be found in 6 different revisions which can be found on a sticker at the back of the device. The revisions are A1, A2, B1, B2, B3 and B4. I have described DBT-120 revision B4 in this review. D-Link warns that the drivers for the different revisions are not interchangeable so be careful when downloading new drivers from the net.

The device is compatible with USB 1.1 and Bluetooth 1.1, the drivers include support for Windows 98SE, 2000, XP and Mac OS 10.2. There is no Linux support so far.

Final thoughts

All things considered, this experience was mostly bad but at the end my friend got what he needed, a way to transfer pictures to and from the phone. I find that the drivers for this device need a bit of work to be reliable and the manual could be more informative.


Recommended: No