Excessive use of radios in the home for fun and profit
All this “wireless” stuff is getting pretty amazing. It didn’t really hit me until I started using it all at once how much of it I have, but here’s what I’m doing right now: Typing on a bluetooth (wireless!) keyboard and using a bluetooth (wireless!) mouse on the Mac Mini attached to my TV, which is connected via wifi (wireless!) to a linksys wrt54g access point, which is connected via an actual ethernet cable to my Soekris box running OpenBSD (this is normally my home router, when the cable modem is working), which is connected via yet another actual ethernet cable to my laptop, which has an EVDO cellular modem in it (wireless!) and is providing the Internet connection for my apartment, because my cable is out. (which is another story, of course).
Simultaneously, my cellphone - which has its own GSM (wireless!) connection to T-Mobile - is connected to my Mac Mini via bluetooth (wireless!) because I have been sending mp3 files to it to use as ringtones, and also connected to my home network via wifi (wireless!) to provide it with a data connection to the outside world.
Additionally, I was just talking to Jenny on my nifty 5.8ghz cordless phone (wireless!) which is connected to the VOIP box (I use Vonage presently), which is connected via an actual ethernet cable to the Soekris box, which routes it out through my laptop’s cellular connection to the internet. That’s right, I’m using VOIP over cellular packet data, and it works just fine.
So, for the record, I’m sitting here on my couch in my living room using no fewer than nine radios simultaneously, and there are several more not currently active: the wifi card in my laptop, the wifi card in Jenny’s desktop computer, and the other cordless phone handset in the other room. Oh, and I suppose you can count the wireless Gamecube controller, which also uses RF, plus the PSP in the other room which has wifi, along with Jenny’s wifi-enabled laptop, the bluetooth dongle on my linux workstation, my wireless headphones and their ipod adapter, and of course I’m planning on getting a bluetooth earpiece for my cellphone (since putting something shaped like a poptart up to my face isn’t all that comfortable), for a grand total of at least 18 frequently-used radio devices in my little apartment. Note what’s not present in the list: any receive-only devices. I have an FM radio, but I really never use it.
So, I guess I’m slightly unusual in the amount of techno gadgetry that I have, but the only odd things I’m doing here are 1) using wifi on my cellphone, and 2) connecting to the internet via EVDO cellular. I’m sure plenty of people can top the number of concurrently-used radios, too. Can any of you? (hell, does anybody actually read this blog?) Please post a comment :)