man, oh, man–i love when you’re working on a hack and then see someone else do it and figures out stuff you didn’t think of. i had been using my ibook with the external bluetooth dongle, but was thinking of putting one internally in the ibook, this hack shows you how to do this. the only downside with this is the usb port can’t be used for anything else, i think another way might be to solder in a small usb hub then add the bluetooth inside.
because of the crippling of the usb usage this hack could be better by picking up a mini usb hub, taking it apart and instead of connecting the BT directly to the usb port to connect it to the hub and the hub be connected to the usb port then using the same soldering technique applied to the BT do so to the exposed usb port from the hub. now your daisy chaining is in place and all is well and done without the restrictions and limitations of disabling a perfectly fine usb port :)
Israel Torres
There is actually another USB header on the logic board that is intended for the original apple bluetooth module to connect to.
If you used that instead of the external usb socket connector, you wouldn’t lose a USB port.
Take a look at the apple service manual for the ibook, page 76 or so:
ftp://grijan.cjb.net:21000/macintosh/Manuals/ibg4.pdf
i wonder if it’s possible to “piggy back” with the connection in a USB mouse.
install a BT module inside the casing of the mouse and have it’s wiring attached with that of the mouse.
just a thought.
I dunno if this is really a hack. I mean, all you’re doing is extending the USB port. very simple.
this doesn’t relate to this hack, but is rather a request. does anyone know of a way to cheaply hooking up a ps2 wirelessly? the cheapest I can see is shelling out for a linksys game adapter or ethernet to wireless bridge. is there any way of modding around to get something else worked out for this?
How do you deactivate the bluetooth to prevent power drainage from your battery?
>> “Deactivate BT module?
posted Oct 30, 2004, 2:30 PM ET by andrew
How do you deactivate the bluetooth to prevent power drainage from your battery?”
remove battery… :)
Or you could install a switch somewhere. Not sure where you could stick it though.
you can turn off the Bluetooth module in the OS. you can place the on/off switch conveniently on the top right of the menu bar.
it may still be drawing power in the “off” state, but that’s negligible.
has anyone tried to insert bluetooth dongle to logic board connector? and is it really USB connector(four pins)?
for non – iBook bluetooth, the 3.0v of 3com’s bluetooth pc card (xjack bluetooth antenna) works with keyboards/mice/cell phones. I haven’t tried it with bluetooth headsets tho’. Got one in my 1ghz Ti.
Cool hack.. I am going to do this to my mac mini this weekend and post the hack. Except, I am going to put in a four port hub, griffin sound card, dlink bluetooth and an a 802.11g usb. I’ll upload the hacks next week.
I would; however, like offer some thoughts and suggestions. It might be cool to remove the cases and usb connectors from the circuit board as you don’t have a lot of realestate.
I would also seriously suggest RF sheilding and keeping the wires as short as possible. Without the rf sheilding, your wire has the potential to be an antenna radiating an rf signal around 12MHZ which could cause troubles. I would also suggest soldering a .1uf decoupling cap across vcc and ground on all of your usb devies to reduce the possiblity of problems with noise.
When I do my hack I also plan to run one usb port back to the external usb port on the mac so I do not lose either of my external ports.
has anyone tried connecting an aftermarket usb BT dongle to the logic board connector?
you don’t even need a usb hub… you can just buy a splitter
which can be found at the following:
http://www.xpcgear.com/usbsplitter.html
or make a splitter yourself :-P
I would like to do this mod on a G3 800 MHz iBook. Any suggestions?
TIA
Gary
You can buy the bluetooth module to install yourself from an apple certified shop… or from internet parts stores…
I’m sure this method was cheaper… but it’s just plain stupid… There’s an internal USB connector he could have used that’s intended for the apple bluetooth module…
http://www.powerbookmedic.com/iBook-G4-Bluetooth-Adapter-Kit-p-16632.html
Hello all,
nice hack, and useful comments.
I have an idea for a similar thing on my (ancient) PowerBook G4 Ti.
Having the BlueTooth thing sticking out of the machine is downright unpractical, so fitting it inside makes a lot more sense.
But as mentioned in the comments, being left with only one USB-port is also awkward.
Therefore it is really necessary to have a hub to regain the number of USB-ports.
Another comment regarding the power-consumption ( especially when the machine sleeps ) has been mentioned, and BlueTooth is regarded as a quite power-consuming technology.
Since the USB-ports are powered even in sleep, a solution could be to add a small relay that is powered from the FireWire-port, since that powers down in sleep.
Currently I have only this machine, so I am not too keen on tinkering with it, but as soon as I have a ‘Plan B’ the project will be started and my results will be posted here.
PBMan
i wonder what size or what kind is the usb connector in the logic board, i want to do this mod, but i want to be sure if i can get the connetor…
The other thing that worries me is that a USB need 5V and the socket on the logic board works with 3.7V?….I might be able to put something in between to put the volt down a bit….(i dont know if is neccesary)…
On a similar note:
I wonder if this could be done on a MB/MBP using a USB GPS dongle. The dongle I have can still “see” 5-7 satellites in a basement with no windows, so it might work in the case or if there was a small window drilled(it’s only a computer, not a child, you can drill it :P). I hate that it sticks out the side, I”m always afraid of snapping it off. This would be great and who else has a MBP with built in GPS? hehe
wow! thanks for the info.. i really love the info that you gave to me!
Hey forum members
I just joined this forum.
Great work by the admin, mods and seriously every member around.
A few days ago I read that there is a treatment for diabetes on http://www.healthcaredaily.org
Is this way of curing diabetes mentioned actually true, If so I should have found out earlier! The website http://www.healthcaredaily.org looks legit
Could you someone tell me if this healthcare information is for real?
Thanks
Loolillefly
Hello, tnx for your precious post about firewire usb hub, well done!
Доброго времени суток!
Решил поделится своей проблемой. Я ищу кондиционеры. Скоро лето, я живу на последнем этаже, на южной стороне дома. Летом такая жара, что спасает исключительно холодный душ несколько раз в день. Посоветуйте который кондиционер оптимально мало жрет энергии ? А то у меня и куллер стоит дома + 3 компа…За электричество огого выходит :( На yourconditions.ru спрашивал, но они что-то невразумительное сказали, я ничего и не понял.
В общем хочется узнать мнение народа! ) Жду!
Thanks so much for the story – I think I’ll added your article to my website.