6.4 Connecting a PDA

Phones aren't the only reason to use Bluetooth on your Mac. Some PDAs (such as the Palm Tungsten T) have built-in Bluetooth, while others (like the Palm m500 series) can add it on via a Bluetooth Secure Digital (SD) card.

6.4.1 Pairing Your PDA and Mac

If you've previously paired your Mac with a phone, most of this section should look pretty familiar. The primary difference is, unsurprisingly, setting up Bluetooth on your PDA. The following assumes that you have a Palm Tungsten T; other Palm devices should be fairly similar.

6.4.1.1 Pairing the Mac from the Palm

As with a phone, you can start pairing your PDA on either the Mac side or the Palm side. On the Palm, start by running the Prefs application, choosing Communication and then Bluetooth (see Figure 6-19).

Figure 6-19. Palm Bluetooth preferences

Turn Bluetooth on, give your PDA a meaningful device name, and set discoverable to "Yes." "Allow Wakeup" has three options: choosing "Yes" will enable your Mac to wake up your Palm when something's being exchanged. Choosing "Scheduled" is the same as "Yes," but only between the hours that you specify. Selecting "Yes" takes more battery power than "Scheduled," and "Scheduled" takes more battery power than "No."

Just because you set your PDA to allow wakeup doesn't mean that any random Bluetooth device can wake it up. Only devices that are trusted and previously connected are allowed to do that.

Click the "Trusted Devices" button and a list will display of any previously paired devices (see Figure 6-20).

Figure 6-20. Trusted Devices window

Click on the "Add Device" button, and a "Bluetooth Discovery" window will appear, looking for a local, discoverable Bluetooth device. If found, a "Discovery Results" window will display, with a prompt showing the device. Select the device, and then click the "OK" button. A "Bluetooth Security" window will display requesting a passkey; when entered, a window will appear on your Mac (Figure 6-21) asking for the same passkey.

Figure 6-21. OS X's response to receiving a pairing request

At this point, it's been our experience that you will frequently receive an error on the Palm saying "Unable to add <your Mac name> to your trusted device list." It appears that this error message is itself in error, as the device has always been successfully added.

6.4.1.2 Pairing the Palm from the Mac

If you want to start the pairing procedure from the Mac, you'll still need to start off by setting the PDA to have Bluetooth on and be discoverable, as shown in the previous section. On the Mac, launch Bluetooth Setup Assistant and choose "Other Device" (as shown in Figure 6-22), and click "Continue."

Figure 6-22. Bluetooth Setup Assistant for PDAs

A window similar to the one in Figure 6-23 will appear, showing your Palm device. Select it and click "Continue."

Figure 6-23. Bluetooth finding a PDA

Once again, enter the same passkey on both the Mac and the Palm, and they're connected.