FSC-FAQ

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General

What is Bluetooth 4.0?

Bluetooth 4.0 consists of Bluetooth BR/EDR (also known as classic Bluetooth) and Low Energy (LE, first introduced in Bluetooth 4.0). Bluetooth 4.0 is backward compatible with Bluetooth 3.0/2.1/2.0. It defines many profiles for data and audio communication, such as SPP/GATT/HID for data communication, and HFP/A2DP/AVRCP for audio communication.

What is Bluetooth dual-mode?

Bluetooth dual-mode supports both classic Bluetooth and BLE simultaneously.

What are the advantages of Bluetooth dual-mode modules?

There are two main smartphone platforms: iOS and Android.
iOS devices can communicate with Bluetooth peripherals via GATT or SPP (requires MFi certification). Since MFi coprocessors are expensive and MFi certification is not easy to obtain, most customers prefer to use GATT for communication with iOS devices.
The Android system has supported BLE since Android v4.3, but due to severe system fragmentation, many Android phones on the market support BLE with poor compatibility. Therefore, it is recommended to use the traditional Bluetooth SPP profile for data communication.
To sum up: When a product needs to support both iOS and Android devices, Bluetooth dual-mode products are the mainstream choice in the market currently.

What is Bluetooth BLE?

Devices that only support the Low Energy part of Bluetooth 4.0 are called Bluetooth BLE devices.

What is MFi certification, and when is MFi certification required?

Apple MFi (Made for iPhone/iPod/iPad) certification is a license for authorized manufacturers to produce accessories for iOS devices. Each accessory requires an MFi coprocessor chip.
When you find that the data rate of BLE GATT cannot meet your needs, you may need to obtain MFi certification to use the SPP protocol on iOS devices.

What is the typical transmission range of Bluetooth modules?

Most Bluetooth devices are Class 2 with a range of 10 meters, but some Bluetooth modules are Class 1 with a range of 100 meters or more. For example,
Feasycom’s FSC-BT909 can reach a range of 300 meters.

What are the maximum data rates of SPP and GATT?

Different modules may have different maximum data rates. Taking BT836B as an example, when the module operates in high-speed mode under optimal conditions (distance between Bluetooth devices is less than 1m, no obstacles between Bluetooth devices, and the remote Bluetooth device has excellent performance) with a UART baud rate of 921600 bps, its maximum SPP transmission speed can reach 82 kB/s, and its maximum reliable BLE transmission speed can reach 62 kB/s.

Can the module support iBeacon, WeChat connection, and WeChat Shake function?

Yes, it requires specific program support. For details, please consult Feasycom engineers or refer to relevant technical documents.

Why do Chinese characters sent from the mobile phone display as garbled characters on the serial port?

Please confirm whether the currently used serial port tool supports Chinese character sets. If it does, please confirm that the received Chinese characters correspond to it (such as UCS2, UTF8, etc.).
Or contact Feasycom engineers to obtain a serial port tool that supports Chinese characters.

Appendix

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