Patent ID: 7818037

Claim:
An apparatus for wirelessly communicating audio information to and from a half-duplex wireless communications device, the apparatus comprising: an adapter for coupling to the half-duplex wireless communications device, and a microphone assembly for wirelessly communicating information to the adapter; wherein said microphone assembly comprises: a speaker to output audio information to a user; a microphone to receive audio information from the user; a switch; a microphone transceiver to wirelessly transmit information to the adapter; and a microphone processor for receiving information from the microphone, switch and microphone transceiver and providing information to the speaker and microphone transceiver, the processor providing a first transmit mode signal indicating a status of the switch and a signal representative of the audio information received from the user to the microphone transceiver for transmission to the adapter, wherein the signal representative of the audio information is not transmitted to the adapter based on control information received from the adapter; and said adapter comprises: an interface for coupling to the half-duplex wireless communications device; an adapter transceiver to wirelessly receive from the microphone assembly the first transmit mode signal and the signal representative of the audio information; and an adapter processor operably coupled to the interface to provide a second transmit mode signal to the half-duplex wireless communications device upon receipt of the first transmit mode signal, wherein, if the first transmit mode signal switch indicates that the switch is engaged, the second transmit mode signal is used to control the half-duplex wireless communications device to enter a half-duplex transmission mode for the half-duplex wireless communications device to wirelessly communicate the signal representative of the audio information to another wireless communications device.