Bluetooth

CMPE 257 - Wireless and Mobile Networking

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 Overview
• Cable replacement technology.
– Connect devices such as phone handsets,
headsets, computer peripherals, etc.
• Industry standard.
– Allows wireless communication between
devices.

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 Applications: Cable Replacement

▪ 1 Mb/s.
• Range ~10 meters. Why not use Wireless LANs?
• PANs - power
- cost
• Single chip radio.
– Low power & low cost.
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 Applications: Synchronization

• Automatic synchronization of
calendars, address books,
business cards.

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 Applications: Cordless
Headset

Cordless
headset
• Multiple device
access.
• Hands-free operation.

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 More applications…
• Conference table.
• Cordless computer.
• Instant photo transmission.
• Cordless phone.

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 Bluetooth Origins
• Study by Ericsson Mobile Communications in
1994.
– Alternatives to cables connecting mobile
phones to accessories.
– Use of radio links instead of infrared.
• Why?
– Transmission of data and voice.
• Result: Bluetooth spec.
– Named after Harald Blatand (Danish for
Bluetooth).
– 10th century Viking king who united Denmark
and Norway.

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 Bluetooth SIG History
• Early 1998: Bluetooth SIG is formed.
– Promoter company group: Ericsson, IBM,
Intel, Nokia, Toshiba.
– Goal: develop license-free technology for
universal wireless connectivity.
– Target: handheld market.
– Bluetooth spec: defines RF wireless
communication interface and protocols.

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 Bluetooth SIG History
• May 1998: Public announcement of Bluetooth SIG.
• July 1999: 1.0A spec (>1,500 pages) published.
• December 1999: version 1.0B released.
• December 1999: promoters increases to 9.
– 3Com, Lucent, Microsoft, Motorola
• February 2000: 1,800+ adopters.
• February 2001: version 1.1 out.

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 More History…
• Recently, IEEE 803.15.1 standard for
Wireless PANs (WPANs)
– Only MAC and PHY.

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 Goals
• Open spec.
• Low cost.
– In order to replace cables, should have similar cost.
– Cell phone cable is ~ $10.
• Power efficiency.
• Lightweight and small form factor.
• Easy to use.
• Reliable and resilient to failures.

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 The Bluetooth Standard
• Defines a protocol stack to enable
heterogeneous devices to communicate.
• The Bluetooth stack includes protocols for
the radio layer all the way up to device
discovery, service discovery, etc.

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 Bluetooth Protocol Stack
Applications Application
RFCOMM/SDP Presentation Layer
L2CAP Session Layer
Host Controller Interface
Transport Layer
Link Manager
Network Layer
Link Controller
Data Link Layer
Baseband
PHY
RF
OSI/ISO

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 Bluetooth Layers
• Radio: physically transmits/receives data.
• Baseband/Link Controller: controls PHY.
• Link Manager: controls links to other devices.
• Host Controller:e2e communication.
• Logical Link Control:
multiplexes/demultiplexes data from higher
layers.
• RFCOMM: RS323-like serial interface.
• SDP: allows service discovery among
Bluetooth devices.

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 Bluetooth Radio Link

1Mhz

. . .
12 3 79
83.5 Mhz
• MA scheme: Frequency hopping spread spectrum.
– 2.402 GHz + k MHz, k=0, …, 78
– 1,600 hops per second.
– 1 Mb/s data rate.

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 BT Radio Link (Cont’d)
• Time-division duplex (TDD)
– Separation of Xmission and reception in time.
– Units alternate transmits and receives.
• Gaussian Frequency Shift Keying (G-FSK)
modulation.
– ‘1’s as positive frequency deviations from
carrier frequency; ‘0’s as negative deviations.

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 Multiple Access

• BT targets large number of independent

communications active in the same area at the same
time.
• Single FH channel: 1 Mb/s.
• Each 1Mb/s channel shared by limited number of
participants.
– In target user scenarios, it’s unlikely that all units in-
range will share data among all of them.
– 1 MB/s is reasonable. (is it?)
• Theoretically, total bandwidth is 79 Mb/s.
– In practice, < 79 Mb/s since codes are non-orthogonal.

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 Master and Slaves
• Communicating devices must agree on
hopping sequence.
• BT devices can operate as masters or slaves.
• Master node defines sequence to be used.
• Slave units use master id to pick sequence.
• Master also controls when devices are
allowed to transmit.
– Master allocates slots to slaves.
– Allocates total available bandwidth among
slaves.
– 3 bits identification - 000 to 111( one is master
rest 7 slaves)
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 Piconets
• BT communication takes place over piconets.
• Piconet formation initiated by master.
• All other participants are slaves.
• Number of participants limited to 8 (1 master and 7
slaves).
– Channel capacity and addressing overhead.
– Each slave assigned a locally unique ID.
• Master/slave roles last for the duration of the piconet.

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 More on Piconets
• On a piconet, slaves only have direct links to
master.
• Point-to-point or point-to-multipoint
connections.

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 Piconets: Considerations
• Most target applications involve local
communication among small group of
devices.
• Piconets with up to 8 nodes match well.
• If many groups of devices active
simultaneously, each group as separate
piconet.
• Overlapping piconets can coexist.
• Collection of piconet scatternet

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 Contention-Free MA
• Master and slaves.
• Master performs medium access control.
– Schedules traffic through polling.
• Time slots alternate between master and slave
transmission.
– Master-slave: master includes slave address.
– Slave-master: only slave chosen by master in previous
master-slave slot allowed to transmit.
– If master has data to send to a slave, slave polled
implicitly; otherwise, explicit poll.

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 BT States

Standby . Initially, all nodes in

Unconnected standby.
. Node (master) can begin
inquiry to find nearby
Inquiry Page
Connecting devices.
. Piconet is then formed.
Transmit . Devices join by paging.
Connected
Active

Park Hold Sniff

Low power
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 Inquiry

• Device discovery
• Listeners respond with
their address.

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 Paging
Master

Active Slave
• Device enters paging to
invite others to join its
Parked Slave
piconet.
• Establishes links with nodes Standby
in proximity.
• Paging message unicast to
selected receiver.
• Receiver sends ACK.
• Sender becomes master,
receiver slave.

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 Piconet New Node Admission
• Master can actively try to discover new nodes
or wait (in scan/listen mode) to be discovered.
• Communication in the current piconet
suspended.
• Admission latency versus piconet capacity
tradeoff.

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 Bluetooth Link Formation

• Point-to-point link:
– Master-slave relationship.
m s

m
• Piconet:
– 8 units: channel capacity. s s
– Master (establishes piconet) can s
connect to up to 7 slaves.
– Master/slave relationship lasts while
link/piconet lasts.
– No slave-to-slave communication.

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 Link Types
• 2 types of links:
– Synchronous (SCO) links:
• Point-to-point between master and slave.
• Link established by reserving slots in either direction
periodically.
• Used to carry real-time traffic (voice).
– Asynchronous (ACL) links:
• Point-to-multipoint between master and slaves.
• Use remaining slots on channel.
• Traffic scheduled by master.

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 Error Control
• Supports both FEC and retransmission.
• FEC for SCO packets.
• ARQ for ACL traffic.
– If no ACKs, retransmit.
– Stop-and-wait ARQ.
• Fast-ARQ: ACK included in RX slot
immediately following the TX slot in which
packet was sent.
– CRC to check for errors.

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 Packet Format

72 bits 54 bits 0 - 2744 bits

Access
Header Payload
code

No CRC
No retries Voice Data CRC

FEC (optional)
ARQ
625 µs
FEC (optional)

master

slave

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 Access Code

72 bits

Access Payload
Header
code

• Address of piconet master.

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 Multiple Piconets
• Piconets may overlap in space and time.
• They can work independently.
– Each with its own hopping sequence.
– Packets with different access codes.
• Or they can overlap, i.e., nodes can
participate in more than 1 piconet.
– “Time sharing”.

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 Scatternets

• Interconnection of multiple piconets.

Slave

Master

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 Scatternets (cont’d…)
• Interconnection by bridge nodes.
– Bridge nodes are members of piconets they
interconnect.
– Bridge node “stay” in a piconet for some time,
then switch to another piconet by changing
hop sequence.
– Do this for all member piconets.
– Send and receive in each piconet.
– Forward from one piconet to another.

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 Power Management
• Low-power modes: prolong battery life.
– Devices can be turned-off when idle.
– Devices wake up periodically to send/receive
data.

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 Low-Power Operation
• 3 modes:
– Hold: node sleeps for specified interval.
• Master can put slaves in hold while searching for new
members, attending another piconet, etc.
• No ACL packets.
– Sniff: slave low-duty cycle mode.
• Slave wakes up periodically to talk to master.
• Fixed “sniff” intervals.
– Park:
• Very low power state.
• Used to admit more than 7 slaves in piconet.
– Slave gives up its active member address.
– Receives “parked” member address.
• Wakes up periodically listening for broadcasts which can be
used to “unpark” node.

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 Bluetooth on the market:
PC cards, Cell phones, Head sets, Chip sets,…
Company Features Applications Cost
Toshiba, 20 dBm (~100 m) File Transfer, 169 $
Motorola, Point-to-multipoint Dial-Up Networking ---
Digianswer No Scatternet LAN access, Fax, … 200 $
0 dBm (~10 m) File Transfer,
IBM, TDK Point-to-multipoint Dial-Up Networking 169 $
No Scatternet LAN access, Fax, … ---
10 m user-user; File Transfer,
100 m user-Base Station Dial-Up Networking
3COM Point-to-multipoint LAN access, Fax, E-mail 149 $
SW- & FW-upgradeable Unconscious connection
10 m user-user; File Transfer,
Point-to-point Dial-Up Networking
Nokia Connectivity Battery LAN access, Fax, E-mail 149 $
for the cell phone Unconscious connection
10 m user-user;
Ericsson, Basic BT Radio stack
Point-to-point; 500 $
Sigma Embedded or Host stack
ARM processor;
Programmable 1500$
USB; RFCOMM ports

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