Sharing and Working with Devices in Your Network
- 12/23/2010
- Sharing a Printer with Computers on Your Home Network
- Sharing a Printer with Your Homegroup
- Stop Sharing the Printer
- Sharing a Removable Disk Drive
- Transferring Files Between Mobile Phones and Your Windows 7 Computer via Bluetooth
- Enabling Bluetooth on Your Computer and Allowing Connections
- Turning On Bluetooth on Your Mobile Phone
- Pairing Your Computer with Your Mobile Phone, Starting from Your Phone
- Pairing Your Computer with Your Mobile Phone, Starting from Your Computer
- Exchanging Files Between Your Computer and Your Mobile Phone
- Exchanging Files Between Your Mobile Phone and Your Computer
- Removing the Pairing Between Your Mobile Phone and Your Computer
- Key Points
Enabling Bluetooth on Your Computer and Allowing Connections
The first task is to enable Bluetooth, both on your computer and on your mobile phone. The procedure is not very complicated, but it does require attention—especially during the setup process—so pay attention to the steps described in this chapter.
In this exercise, you will learn how to enable Bluetooth on your Windows 7 laptop or netbook. You will also learn how to set it to allow connections from other devices such as your mobile phone.
Set Up
Install all the drivers provided by the manufacturer of your laptop, including those for Bluetooth. Then, make sure the Bluetooth device is turned on. To turn it on, locate the button on the side of your computer or above its keyboard. Typically, you can determine whether Bluetooth is enabled by an illuminated Bluetooth LED icon on the surface of your laptop or netbook. In addition, the Bluetooth icon from the taskbar turns from red (or completely missing) to white.
Go to the notification area of the Windows 7 taskbar and open the list of icons.
Right-click the Bluetooth icon.
The contextual menu, which contains a list of Bluetooth-related configuration options, opens.
Click Open Settings.
The Bluetooth Settings window opens.
In the Options tab, select the Allow Bluetooth devices to find this computer check box.
This allows your computer to be discovered by other Bluetooth devices.
Select Allow Bluetooth devices to connect to this computer.
If this setting is not enabled, other devices will not be able to connect to your computer.
Select Alert me when a new Bluetooth devices wants to connect.
With this setting enabled, you are notified when new—and possibly unauthorized—devices want to connect to your computer, which allows you to act, if needed.
Select Show the Bluetooth icon in the notification area.
This allows you to easily access the Bluetooth capabilities on your computer and use them as required.
Click OK.
The Bluetooth on your computer is now enabled, correctly configured, and ready to establish connections to and interact with other devices.
Clean Up
No cleanup is required.