First off, you'd be surprised at what your gov can and in many cases will do in order to protect itself from precieved threats. I don't think Echelon was even that hard to pull off, it was your own congress who changed the term from "evesdropping on our own citzens" into "lawful interception" with the PATRIOT act.
On the other hand, it is true that GPS tracking systems on their own cannot be used to track you down without you knowing so, however, GPS-embedded cellphones can be used to keep tabs on an american citizen if for some reason they'd be suspected in aiding terrorists.
Makes all kinds of sense, after all 2.4Ghz's a pretty "crowded" freaquency band as it is, for example in my apartment with the Wifi router,PC and PS3 with 2 controllers , 4 BT equippet moblies, 2 of which work with Wifi, 2 BT headsets, about 5-10 neighbouring Wifi networks, and to top it all an Air Force base flooding the airwaves using UHF comm. and doppler radars convinently blasting which frequancy band? that's right, good old 2.4 G.
And now to the point. most recent devices are equipped with frequancy hopping features, meaning two paired devices will hop together across the frequency band at set intervals whenever something interferes with the signal, the problems start when so many devices (see aforementioned well connecected loft built freakishly close to an AFB) are found in eachother's range that they run out of frequencies to hop over, that's when you get the interference. Therefore, seeing as it's not only a question of signal strength as it is with older (and lamer) RF based protocols, with Wifi and BT it might not be neccesary to insulate the console itself with a lead sheet, when you can eliminate other sources of interference and "free up" some more of the band.
Hope someone who struck through to the end of the post could make use of it all! John.
Let the hive mind of Engadget get that for you.
"I love my little computing companion but I often find myself missing a full sized keyboard. I have been looking at several of these portable and flexible keyboards, but I can't seem to make up my mind about which I should buy. I don't want the keyboard to be overly expensive, but I want it to be good quality. Also, how difficult is it to type on these keyboards? Thanks!"
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