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Parani BT and Trimble access

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(@john-hamilton)
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I have Trimble Access on my laptop. Among other things I use it to run a Trimble R10 with a bluetooth connection. This only works up to about 30 to 50 feet, and then it loses the connection to the receiver. I bought a Parani BT dongle thinking this would help get more range, but I cannot get it to work at all.?ÿ

Has anyone used one of these dongles for this? If so, what do I need to do to configure it properly? The laptop is running windows 10 Pro.?ÿ

 
Posted : 22/11/2019 1:05 pm
(@richard-imrie)
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I have a pair of Parani LR BT for a robotic TS. They were pretty much plug and play. Serial I/O at the RTS and serial I/O at the data collector. They do need a null modem though, but in this case I think I achieved that by crossing over TX and RX at one of the Parani's. I'm wondering if a pair of Paranis is needed, i.e. a Parani will only talk to a Parani, but I don't think that is the case as I have sonar setup that had Parani at the sonar and internal BT at the DC. A pair of Paranis should pair and connect automatically (after the initial setup) regardless of whether there is any TX going on, which is a useful indication that they are likely to be able to talk to each other.

Presumably you have checked the comm port config for the Parani at the laptop and Trimble Access, and baud rate etc.

One odd thing I found with Parani sonar setup was that the NMEA data needed to be limited in quantity, otherwise it didn't work, i.e. the default sentences were position, depth and few other things, and I needed to restrict it to TX a lot fewer things.?ÿ

The other odd thing I have found in the past is that some Trimble BT gear will only talk to other Trimble gear.

 
Posted : 23/11/2019 1:13 pm
(@john-hamilton)
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@richard-imrie

I messed around with it some yesterday, but I could not get the laptop to stop using the built-in BT. Also, I have about 50 com ports showing in device manager, I went in and deleted them one by one and when I rebooted they all came back.

?ÿ

I remember that on a handheld TSC2 it would connect using BT to the receiver, but if I tried to connect to a receiver that did not have BT (i.e. a 4700), it would do so through the serial port on the TSC2. Not sure if the current version of Trimble Access will connect through a serial port (i.e. not BT), I don't see any option to set that up.?ÿ

 
Posted : 24/11/2019 6:38 am
(@richard-imrie)
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I presume you've been through the Parani website and its technical guides. The one I looked at mentioned disabling other BT drivers.

http://www.senanetworks.com/ud100-g03.html?sc=14&category=3968

https://senatech.app.box.com/s/vf47pbaiurp8bvg1ixwqapj65ar5j94h

 
Posted : 24/11/2019 9:52 pm
(@john-hamilton)
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@richard-imrie

I need to figure out how to disable the built in BT, and I need to be careful because I don't want to be left with no BT at all. 

 
Posted : 25/11/2019 3:59 pm
(@richard-imrie)
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That's a tricky one, like most of the BT mystery. I found this on the www:

https://mindmedia.freshdesk.com/support/solutions/articles/36000103081-how-to-use-bluetooth-dongle-and-disable-internal-bluetooth

So I looked at our Win10 HP Laptop and immediately saw under device manager that it isn't called "Bluetooth Radios", it is just "Bluetooth" and like you there are a lot of devices to go through.

 
Posted : 25/11/2019 9:19 pm
(@azweig)
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@john-hamilton

Would it be as easy as clicking the Windows icon in the task bar, then settings, then devices, then just turning off the bluetooth for when you needed to use the Paraini?

2019 11 26 06 26 05 Settings

 

 
Posted : 26/11/2019 3:28 am