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Bug#525220: Bluetooth problem caused by fake dongles?



On Tue, 2011-06-21 at 22:07 +0100, Mark Hobley wrote:
> --- On Tue, 21/6/11, Alexander Heinz <mailsanmich@gmx.li> wrote:
> 
> > The USB IDs corresponds to CSR but the
> > chip label says ASC AS3620QA. This is a counterfeit.
> > 
> > Is very easy to tell. Just open your dongle and check the
> > label on the chip.
> 
> Bloody hell Alex. I just took your advise and opened the dongle. And
> woah! It does say ASC AS3620QA. Presumably, these are bluetooth chips,
> but they do work with the CSR driver. That is a shock. I deliberately
> chose these dongles because they were advertised as being CSR.

Interestingly, the Bluetooth address gives away the real manufacturer
without any need to open the dongle.  The first three bytes of a MAC
address are an 'OUI' which you can look up in
<http://standards.ieee.org/develop/regauth/oui/oui.txt>.  There we see:

00-1F-81   (hex)		Accel Semiconductor Corp
001F81     (base 16)		Accel Semiconductor Corp
				1F,Mainbldg,149 Chun Xiao Road,
				Shanghai  201203
				CHINA

I would suspect the device manufacturer (not ASC) of fraudulently using
CSR's vendor ID.  They may also be using ASC's addresses without
permission, or they may have been delegated a small block which they are
reusing repeatedly.

> I wonder if we can get an ASC AS3620QA driver (or is it likely that
> someone will develop one?), or have I been sold some dead ducks?

There is a standard USB 'device class' for Bluetooth adapters, which are
all handled by the 'btusb' driver.  I don't see why ASC would
deliberately deviate from the standard, though the chip or its firmware
may have bugs.

Ben.

-- 
Ben Hutchings
Editing code like this is akin to sticking plasters on the bleeding stump
of a severed limb. - me, 29 June 1999

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