Apple's Wireless Bluetooth, How Far Does It Reach?

When we posted our recent review of Apple's new wireless Bluetooth mouse and keyboard, a number of readers wrote us wondering how far the signal reaches. In response to our question of why, other than curiousity, would one want to know since monitors can't get very far from their computers, we got one reasonable answer. One reader said he'd like to access his Mac while working with his audio equipment across a large room and using Univeral Access features to be able to see the monitor. There may be other reasonable uses as well.

So we set up an experiment. We set up our G4 Cube with a D-Link USB Bluetooth transceiver module (DBT 120 B3) so that we could see the cursor on the screen using the zoom-in feature of the Universal Access preference pane. Then we backed away from it step by step until the cursor no longer responded perfectly to the motion of the Apple wireless Bluetooth mouse. We did the same for the keyboard watching the cursor move among lines of text. The signal fell off too much beyond exactly 23 feet for both the mouse and the keyboard according to a 25-foot tape measure.

We repeated the experiment with our 1-GHz 17" PowerBook G4 which has a built-in Apple Bluetooth transceiver module. This time the signal did not fall off too much until beyond 38 feet, again for both the mouse and the keyboard.

We are surprised at the significant difference in working distance between the D-Link module and Apple's built-in module. While the experiments were conducted in two different locations in the wood-frame building, both were line of sight measurements and not through walls or floors. If you really need distance, you may wish to consider getting a CTO Mac with built-in Bluetooth.