It's hard to know exactly what devices work with Linux, so here's a specific report of my dongle.
I purchased it from Fry's Electronics. It still appears to be for sale for $13, and looks like this: . IMPORTANT: it only supports Bluetooth v1.2, but it was enough for me.
$ cat /etc/issue Ubuntu 6.06.1 LTS \n \l $ uname -a Linux hostname 2.6.15-29-386 #1 PREEMPT Wed Aug 29 13:20:33 UTC 2007 i686 GNU/Linux $ lsusb | grep -i blue Bus 003 Device 004: ID 1131:1001 Integrated System Solution Corp. KY-BT100 Bluetooth Adapter # tail /var/log/messages Sep 13 19:11:50 pocketeer kernel: [17180759.384000] usb 3-1: new full speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 2 Sep 13 19:12:01 pocketeer kernel: [17180769.804000] Bluetooth: HCI USB driver ver 2.9 Sep 13 19:12:01 pocketeer kernel: [17180769.808000] usbcore: registered new driver hci_usb Sep 13 19:13:50 pocketeer kernel: [17180879.364000] Bluetooth: HIDP (Human Interface Emulation) ver 1.1-mh1 $ hciconfig hci0: Type: USB BD Address: 00:11:67:50:D2:D0 ACL MTU: 678:8 SCO MTU: 64:10 UP RUNNING PSCAN ISCAN RX bytes:3872 acl:128 sco:0 events:210 errors:0 TX bytes:3217 acl:141 sco:0 commands:41 errors:0 $ hcitool scan Scanning ... 00:07:E0:63:2C:78 Kevin WangNow my laptop can see some of the bluetooth devices that I own! More about using the bluetooth dongle: