Emotiv EPOC Flex supports Bluetooth 4.0 which cannot keep up with the high data rate from 32 channels, and therefore recommends using the USB receiver dongle for this purpose – PETER GAMMA (Director & Physiologist), MEDITATION RESEARCH INSTITUTE SWITZERLAND (MRIS)

Last Updated on February 16, 2023 by pg@petergamma.org

We asked to following question to the Emotiv support:

Contradictory information about EMOTIV EPOC Flex – 32-Ch EEG Device connectivity

EPOC Flex has USB for charging and upgrading but it is Iimited for data transfer only when connected to an Extender. This is because you power isolation for patient protection and for noise suppression, features of Extender. When a USB connector is connected data transmission is disabled for patient protection.

EPOC Flex contains a 2.4GHz low-energy radio and is compatible with both the BLE and a 2.4GHz protocol called Gazelle, before Bluetooth this was the method of data communication for the original EPOC / EPOC+ / INSIGHT and so Flex kept this compatibility. EPOC Flex supports Bluetooth 4.0 which cannot keep up with the high data rate from 32 channels and so we have high packet loss. This is why we recommend using the USB receiver dongle.

Also OpenBCI can be connected over usb cable, which is not recommended by www.OpenBCI.com. How is it with OpenBCI over cable as far as speed is concerned? OpenBCI does not recommend using usb cable options. We have discussed this topic in our journal. But if EEG signals are fast over USB with Emotiv Epoc 32 over USB cable, aren t they also fast over USB using OpenBCI?