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#1 2013-11-11 23:24:30

*nixer
Member
Registered: 2011-11-11
Posts: 56

[Solved] Bluetooth headset. Anyone know how to set up?

Hi.

I have a Kinivo BTH220 Bluetooth headset, and I have no idea how to set it up in Linux.

It appears that the wiki article is outdated and incomplete. Does anyone have Bluetooth working for them on the up to date packages?

Last edited by *nixer (2013-11-21 00:54:43)

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#2 2013-11-16 00:55:47

*nixer
Member
Registered: 2011-11-11
Posts: 56

Re: [Solved] Bluetooth headset. Anyone know how to set up?

Anyone. I've tried everything listed in the wiki (even the command line), but nothing works. Why are there so many different ways, but everything like package version or tools are out of sync?

Doesn't anyone on Linux use bluetooth? I can't even get my phone to be recognized.

The wiki mentions starting the bluetooth daemon, and then doesn't even show you how. I just guessed, but it would be nice to have a confirmation. Bluez doesn't even have a man page.

Last edited by *nixer (2013-11-16 00:57:43)

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#3 2013-11-16 14:51:02

dojero
Member
Registered: 2011-11-26
Posts: 36

Re: [Solved] Bluetooth headset. Anyone know how to set up?

I'm not sure where you're looking, but there are extensive discussions in these Arch forums and on the Wiki about bluetooth. You also don't indicate what you've tried. But I will summarize the steps to take to get you started.

You need to install bluetooth from pacman and then run the daemon. That's done with systemd (I'm surprised you don't know this if you're using Arch). So you would start bluetooth with the command "systemctl start bluetooth" (without the quotes, of course). If you want bluetooth enabled each time you boot up, run "systemctl enable bluetooth".

To manage bluetooth, you'll need (want) bluez and blueman. This is where the problems set in. Bluez is a collection of tools for running bluetooth on Linux. The problem is that the newest version, bluez5, isn't working with alsa sound, only with pulse audio.  So if you use alsa for sound management, then you'll need bluez4 (the earlier version). If you use pulse audio, you can use bluez5.

You face the same problem with blueman. Blueman 1.2.23 works with bluez4. Blueman-git works with bluez (which is bluez5).

Once you've got those installed, you should be able to connect to your headset.

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#4 2013-11-16 21:24:05

*nixer
Member
Registered: 2011-11-11
Posts: 56

Re: [Solved] Bluetooth headset. Anyone know how to set up?

dojero wrote:

I'm not sure where you're looking, but there are extensive discussions in these Arch forums and on the Wiki about bluetooth.

Every method in the wiki, with the exception of the ones where the current package versions conflicted.


You need to install bluetooth from pacman and then run the daemon. That's done with systemd (I'm surprised you don't know this if you're using Arch). So you would start bluetooth with the command "systemctl start bluetooth" (without the quotes, of course). If you want bluetooth enabled each time you boot up, run "systemctl enable bluetooth".

Of course I know systemd is the default now, but I don't spend any time setting up the packages other then when they are first installed anymore.

I guessed the command was 'systemctl enable bluetooth.service'. Was that incorrect then?


So if you use alsa for sound management, then you'll need bluez4 (the earlier version). If you use pulse audio, you can use bluez5.

I normally do, but I don't know how to downgrade to Blueman 1.2.23 without doing it manually. I don't want to have to manage any packages outside of pacman.

Blueman-git works with bluez (which is bluez5).

I'll give blueman-git, and pulse audio a try. Thank you.

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#5 2013-11-16 22:13:00

dojero
Member
Registered: 2011-11-26
Posts: 36

Re: [Solved] Bluetooth headset. Anyone know how to set up?

Yes, systemctl enable bluetooth.service is correct (the .service will be assumed if left off, which is how I wrote it). This will mean that bluetooth is running each time you boot your computer.

Downgrading a package can be done in several ways, the easiest being if you have already installed the earlier version at some point. Then it is likely that you still have the package in /var/cache/pacman/pkg.  You install it (downgrade) by running pacman -U /var/cache/pacman/pkg/[name of pkg]

If you don't have the package, it is retrievable from http://seblu.net/a/arm. You can download it and then install using pacman -U [pkg].

In all these cases, you will be using pacman and maintaining the integrity of your system. It is very unlikely that you will find many Arch users on these forums who would recommend losing that integrity.

So if you are unable to get things to work with pulse audio and the latest versions of bluez and blueman, you will still be able to downgrade to bluez4.

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#6 2013-11-17 00:21:02

*nixer
Member
Registered: 2011-11-11
Posts: 56

Re: [Solved] Bluetooth headset. Anyone know how to set up?

blueman-git seems to have been dropped from the aur, and the blueman-bzr uses bluez4. I tried bluez4 with blueman-bzr but had several errors.

I ended up downgrading the blueman package from the repo you posted, and blocked it from being upgraded. It didn't give the errors blueman-bzr did right off the bat. (ie - an error window when loading X)

I added 'Enable=Source,Sink,Media,Socket' to my '/etc/bluetooth/audio.conf', and created the '/etc/asound.conf' with the required setting both per the wiki article. Obviously, I replaced the XXs with my headset address. (Note: the asound.conf file is installed by pulseaudio-alsa, so I had to manually create it.)

After pairing, and connecting to the 'headset service' & 'audio sync' in blueman, I was able to receive output from both aplay and mpv (mplayer) successfully as per the wiki article.

This will work for now as I really wanted it working for media playback, but I noticed all system sounds still played through the default speakers.

Out of curiosity, I also tried connecting to it manually via hcitool, and bluez-simple-agent.

# hcitool scan
Scanning ...
	XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX	Kinivo BTH220
# bluez-simple-agent XX:XX:XX:XX:XX:XX
Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/bin/bluez-simple-agent", line 115, in <module>
    path = manager.FindAdapter(args[0])
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/site-packages/dbus/proxies.py", line 70, in __call__
    return self._proxy_method(*args, **keywords)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/site-packages/dbus/proxies.py", line 145, in __call__
    **keywords)
  File "/usr/lib/python2.7/site-packages/dbus/connection.py", line 651, in call_blocking
    message, timeout)
dbus.exceptions.DBusException: org.bluez.Error.NoSuchAdapter: No such adapter

Any ideas on how to get sound from the main system for things like web browsing and the like?

Last edited by *nixer (2013-11-17 00:22:33)

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#7 2013-11-17 16:47:16

dojero
Member
Registered: 2011-11-26
Posts: 36

Re: [Solved] Bluetooth headset. Anyone know how to set up?

If you want everything to output to the "headset" device, try adding this:

pcm. !default{
  type bluetooth
}

to your asound.conf file.

Keep in mind that by doing so, it is establishing bluetooth as your default output. To return to your system default, you would simply comment out these lines.

I use a script that copies one or another asound.conf file as needed for bluetooth or system default in order to facilitate the back and forth process.

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#8 2013-11-18 20:27:06

vlsd
Member
Registered: 2013-06-24
Posts: 33
Website

Re: [Solved] Bluetooth headset. Anyone know how to set up?

I've had the best luck using bluez (bluez5) and pulseaudio-git for my headset. You can pair and connect using bluetoothctl (see the bluez5 section on the wiki) and pulseaudio will do the rest. As far as I know there is no way to get bluez5 working with ALSA.

Last edited by vlsd (2013-11-22 19:52:28)

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#9 2013-11-21 00:54:30

*nixer
Member
Registered: 2011-11-11
Posts: 56

Re: [Solved] Bluetooth headset. Anyone know how to set up?

Sorry for taking so long, but thanks dojero. Marking this topic as solved.

I'll give the pulseaudio-git a try later to see if it'd make switching between speakers, and headphones, easier. Thanks for the tip.

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#10 2014-02-19 14:49:35

quequotion
Member
From: Oita, Japan
Registered: 2013-07-29
Posts: 813
Website

Re: [Solved] Bluetooth headset. Anyone know how to set up?

Any ideas on what to do for HSP/HFP?

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#11 2014-02-19 15:02:09

Neburski
Member
Registered: 2009-09-15
Posts: 118

Re: [Solved] Bluetooth headset. Anyone know how to set up?

quequotion wrote:

Any ideas on what to do for HSP/HFP?

You shouldn't be necro bumping a solved thread with a question.
Go read the wiki, there's information regarding HSP/HFP.
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Bl … dio_method

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#12 2014-03-12 04:12:18

quequotion
Member
From: Oita, Japan
Registered: 2013-07-29
Posts: 813
Website

Re: [Solved] Bluetooth headset. Anyone know how to set up?

Neburski wrote:

You shouldn't be necro bumping a solved thread with a question.
Go read the wiki, there's information regarding HSP/HFP.

Sorry to bump again, I didn't realize threads are considered dead after less than three months.

I had already read the wiki, which explains netheir the process nor the implications of having to downgrade to bluez4 in order to use HSP/HFP.
After considerable tinkering, I was able to work this out on my own. The problem was more serious than simply installing the packages.

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