Originally Posted by
TrojanHorse
You will need an ANT+ dongle for your laptop to pick up the speed and cadence sensors from your bike. It's unlikely you'll be able to use your laptop's built in bluetooth for some reason. Most people also suggest a USB extension cord so you can get the ANT+ sensor right under your bike.
When pairing sensors in zwift, you should choose the FEC version of ANT+, it seems to be much more reliable than regular ANT+
The issue with Bluetooth and windows is that it isn't just ordinary bluetooth, but BLE or bluetooth-low-energy. And support for that didn't come until Windows 8. I have Win7 on my laptop, so ANT is required. I don't know if you had a newer windows whether BT would work or not, but the ANT dongle are pretty cheap so it isn't that big a deal.
The first ANT dongle I got from Amazon was a dud. Returned it and got a Garmin dongle, and that works fine. If you have it in the floor where sweat might drip on it, then put the thing in a baggie to keep it dry. I learned that one the hard way.