The Bluetooth Special Interest Group has confirmed that Bluetooth 3.0 will be released on April 21st. The Bluetooth 3.0 specs are expected to allow users to see much faster speeds when used in conjunction with 802.11n Wi-Fi while we await the arrival proper ultra-wideband technology. Still, the faster link speeds will be most welcome, especially when large data transfers are required. Of course, this being Bluetooth, the user will not have to worry about actually connecting to a 802.11n Wi-Fi network, that will all be handled invisibly by the Bluetooth devices themselves through the clever use of what I am led to believe is a Generic Alternate MAC/PHY (AMP) that can take advantage of 802.11 speeds using the 802.11 Protocol Adaption Layer.

We will have to wait until the 21st for the precise details, and to discover which companies have new Bluetooth devices ready to start rolling out to consumers. However, we will have to wait quite a bit longer before the Bluetooth Special Interest Group gets anywhere near the 480 Mbps speeds it ultimately wants to see for the Bluetooth spec.