Bluetooth Alarm
Hi, I am trying to use my Sound Rise II as an alarm clock with Bluetooth. What I am having trouble with is that I cannot have the alarm work right unless my phone is already playing music, which defeats the purpose.
I have an Android device, and the app I use to play music is Pi Music Player. Do I need to use a specific music player app with the Sound Rise II to be able to use it as an alarm clock with my phone playing music over Bluetooth as an alarm tone?
Answer
If Bluetooth is configured as an alarm, and for it to work properly, there are three things you should check.
- What brand of phone are you using and does it come with an embedded music app. We recommend that you use these original brand music apps. Typically, these out-of-the-box music apps either have an API implemented with the phone's operating system, or have an interface that allows the user to configure "Start playback on Bluetooth device" or "Allow Bluetooth devices to evoke music". Different music apps may have different setting paths and different wording. The setting path in a music app will look like
Profile >> Settings >> Connections, but will vary from app to app. In these circumstances, when the alarm goes off, even such a music app is not active on your phone, Sound Rise II is able to send a play command to the phone, launch the music app and play music from the phone. - If you are using an Android device, and a 3rd party music app such as Pi Music Player. As there is no API or auto-evoke configuration available, you must ensure that the Pi Music Player is still active and not terminated by the phone's operating system when the alarm goes off. If the app is closed or inactive, the Sound Rise II will not be able to pull it up via Bluetooth and the alarm will switch to the built-in chime.
- If step#2 has been checked correctly and the Sound Rise II is able to retrieve music from the phone — one good indicator is that the music app on your phone changes its status from "Pause" to "Play" — then check the volume levels on both the phone and the Sound Rise II. If the volume is too low (with weak signals), the Sound Rise II Bluetooth will detect this as Bluetooth unavailable and will also automatically switch to the default chime. You will therefore need to adjust the volume to a moderate level for the Bluetooth alarm to work properly.
Please try these three steps one at a time to see if you can get the Bluetooth alarm to work properly. Feel free to contact us again if you need further assistance from the Soundfreaq team.
Thank you for the detailed response. Sadly I still cannot get the Rise II to play Bluetooth music as an alarm.
My device is a Samsung Galaxy A10e running Android version 9. I have tried using Pi Music Player and Musicolet. Both apps will not run if I put my phone screen to sleep. And I do not see a way to change this behavior.
Are there other devices I could try, such as an MP3 player? Can the Rise II send a play command signal through the Aux in jack, or would the MP3 player need to support Bluetooth as well? Thank you for your time and help.
Answer
Using your Samsung Galaxy A10e and Pi Music Player, could you please test as follows:
- Press the POWER or PAIR button to turn on your Sound Rise II.
- Pair your Samsung Galaxy A10e with the Sound Rise II.
- Open the Pi Music Player app on your phone, play music at a moderate volume (not too low) and then pause the music.
- Press the POWER button to turn off the Sound Rise II.
- Set an alarm (i.e. 2 minutes) on the Sound Rise II and configure Bluetooth as the alarm option.
- When the alarm goes off, see if the Pi Music Player plays music automatically.
Theoretically, the Bluetooth alarm should work fine in this test, but let me know if it does not.
Some more background information as to why sometimes the Bluetooth alarm fails to operation as expected, just for your reference.
For the Bluetooth alarm to work properly, the Sound Rise II needs to retrieve music from the paired phone for playback via Bluetooth. In some use cases, the music apps may have either been manually disabled or closed by the phone's operating system. When the preset alarm time arrives, the music app cannot be automatically launched (either because there is no API, so no command from the phone to the music app, or because the music app does not have such a configuration enabled) to play music, so no Bluetooth alarm.
Very often the music app on the paired phone is not available for the Sound Rise II to retrieve music from. So you see, the key element is that the phone can either restart the music app or find an active music app when the Bluetooth pull command is received. Otherwise the pull command will fail and stop there, resulting in a failed Bluetooth alarm.
In our test suggestion above, we set an alarm that is short enough (2 minutes away) and we know for sure that the Pi Music Player is still active (and not terminated by the phone's OS) and waiting for the pull command to arrive. Again, this should work theoretically, but please contact us again if it does not.
I got it to work! The issue was that I had Bluetooth turned ON while the alarm was set, and that was interfering with the launch signal from the Sound Rise II.
What I have to do is open Pi Music Player, select the song, and with the app open still, put my phone's screen to sleep and ensure Bluetooth is turned off on the Sound Rise II. This sees the Sound Rise play music from my phone when the alarm goes off.
I'd like to repeat my question from my last response: Can the Sound Rise II's alarm start music play with other devices, such as an MP3 player, via Bluetooth OR through the Aux in jack? Or has this not been tested?
Thank you for your help with this!
Answer
I'm glad to hear that you managed to get the Bluetooth alarm option to work.
The Sound Rise II alarm sound only has 3 options — Bluetooth, FM radio and built-in chime — but no line-in.
If you want to use an MP3 player with Bluetooth enabled, it should theoretically work just like a mobile phone, although we never tested any. However, if you connect music from the AUX IN socket, the alarm won't work because there's no such configuration available for this music source.
I hope this clears up your questions. Feel free to contact us again if you have any further questions.
Happy listening!
In order for the Bluetooh alarm to work properly, please make sure that 1) you have an active music app (and not terminated by phone's OS) and 2) volume levels on both your phone and Sound Rise II are loud enough. If you still can't get your Sound Rise II to play Bluetooth music as an alarm, we suggest you try the following test steps:
- Press the POWER or PAIR button to turn on your Sound Rise II
- Pair your phone with your Sound Rise II
- Open the music player app on your phone, play music at a moderate volume (not too low), and then pause the music
- Press the POWER button to turn off your Sound Rise II
- Set an alarm (i.e. in 2 minutes) on your Sound Rise II and configure Bluetooth as the alarm option
- When the alarm goes off, see if the music player plays music automatically In our test suggestion above, we set an alarm that is short enough (2 minutes away) and we know for sure that the music player is still active (and not terminated by the phone's OS). This setup should work properly in theory, but please let us know if it does not, and we will be happy to walk you through the process.