Bluetooth might be a great way to connect peripherals to your computer, but it’s a drag burning through batteries. Broadcom wants to stop that with new technology it claims will offer 10-year battery life in keyboards and other human-interface peripherals. Broadcom’s low-power BCM20730 human interface device (HID) chip and accompanying software will provide these improvements, and devices with this new technology should be backwards compatible with Bluetooth-capable devices that have shipped for the last decade. Broadcom’s approach comes in contrast to Bluetooth SIG’s Low Energy technology, which is part of Bluetooth 4.0 and thus not compatible with older hardware. Additionally, this new technology will eliminate the somewhat-cumbersome “pairing” procedure, thanks to built-in USB HID emulation. While Broadcom hasn’t said when we might see products with these power enhancements, it’s providing references designs to manufacturers now.
Broadcom working to enable 10-year battery life for Bluetooth peripherals
Broadcom is developing new technology that it claims will allow a Bluetooth keyboard to run for up to 10 years on a set of double AA batteries. This technology is based on Broadcom’s BCM20730 chip and is backwards compatible with older Bluetooth-capable devices.
Broadcom is developing new technology that it claims will allow a Bluetooth keyboard to run for up to 10 years on a set of double AA batteries. This technology is based on Broadcom’s BCM20730 chip and is backwards compatible with older Bluetooth-capable devices.
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