Bluetooth support on Mac has always been better than that on Windows. I’ve gotten the impression that much of this is due to various historical bets and battles which, unfortunately, left the customer with pretty weak BT support on Windows. However, with the coming Vista (which I’m just beginning to get the hang of by using it every day for a couple weeks on my main machine), BT support has vastly improved. It’s baked in – no more Widcom or other evil 3rd party stacks - and it supports things like the headset profile (at least in theory – but I’ve yet been able to get it to work).
However, in this area, there is one piece of functionality that I love on the Mac that I see no signs of improvement with Vista for the Windows world. On the Mac, I can use the Apple Address Book application to send SMS text messages to contacts that have mobile numbers entered. Also, when new text messages come in, an alert is produced on the computer screen informing you of the contents and offering you a chance to reply via SMS.
This simple feature is pretty damn cool and really handy. Combine it with the fact that the caller ID information (linked to the appropriate address book entry if available) for incoming calls to your mobile can also appear on your screen, and you have some powerful integration.
As I sit at my desk most days, in front of a computer, I am frequently annoyed that my Windows machines don’t play as nicely with my phone. I get plenty of personal notes throughout the day on SMS (things like “do we need more milk?” from my wife or “are you in SF this week?” from an old friend). It’s so much more elegant to have these appear on my main work screen, and be able to respond to them with a full sized keyboard.
Alas, mobile integration is still not a “priority” (it seems) on Vista. Perhaps the improved baseline BT stack will allow someone to build a 3rd party application on Windows for what exists out of the box on a Mac.
