4 ms·

picture two friends in a car: "oh hey this music is the jam, let me play it for you." 5 minutes of dicking with bluetooth pairing later: "FUCKING BLUETOOTH GOD

by finnh 10y ago

picture two friends in a car: "oh hey this music is the jam, let me play it for you." 5 minutes of dicking with bluetooth pairing later: "FUCKING BLUETOOTH GODDAMN IT. welp, never mind" (conversational lull follows)

mulmen 10y ago
I recently went on a trip with several friends and we rented a new Ford Expedition. The integrated audio system in the car supported multiple Bluetooth devices with a history (including previous renters) but as far as I could tell not more than once device at a time. Every time we started the car we had to select Sources -> Bluetooth -> Connect -> ${device name} -> Sources -> Bluetooth -> ${device name}. It was a huge hassle and a 3.5mm cable would have been far easier and sounded better.
chillacy 10y ago
So one interesting aspect of the airpods is seemingly automatic pairing, without having to dive in settings, through what seems like near-field communication. I'm curious to see if they've solved the multi-device pairing problem too.
- mikeash 10y ago
  The thing is, the pairing UI is rarely the problem. It's the actual pairing implementation. Pairing a phone to a car is usually just a few button presses. Not quite as convenient as NFC or whatever, but not a real problem. The problem arises when you find that Pair button and press it and then it doesn't work and provides no feedback on why it failed. Cue five minutes of screwing around turning things off and on again and finally giving up.
  - chillacy 10y ago
    I'm lucky to not have had that experience for initial pairing. I was recently gifted the beats headphones and they've never had an issue like that, though I do have to re-pair with every device which is my main annoyance. I stopped using a BT trackpad because I would get disconnected randomly though, so maybe it comes down to the devices? Also not the first time we've had a chat in HN comments. How's the robot boxing chess league? ;)
    - mikeash 10y ago
      Devices no doubt play a part, and I think some of it is just dumb luck. Sometimes you might encounter a Bluetooth stack that's been wedged somehow, and it just won't go anywhere. A few weeks ago I was riding with my father and brother in my car, and they both wanted to play some music. We paired my brother's phone and all was well. Then we did my father's phone and we simply couldn't make it work despite a great deal of trying. They have the exact same iPhone model, but one worked and one didn't. A few days later we tried my father's phone again and it worked that time. No idea why. I almost said you had me confused with someone else, then I finally managed to remember that conversation. Where did we even talk about robot chess boxing? I remember discussing it in pretty alarming detail, but I can't remember where.
      - chillacy 10y ago
        I had to look it up, Lee Sedol vs AlphaGo, Man vs Machine: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11304985 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11304985 Almost half a year ago. Not sure how I remembered your name when I forget to pay my rent half the time, but that's my brain I guess.
        mikeash 10y ago
        Thank you, now I can enjoy thinking about the tournament all over again.

by finnh 10y ago

mulmen 10y ago

I recently went on a trip with several friends and we rented a new Ford Expedition. The integrated audio system in the car supported multiple Bluetooth devices with a history (including previous renters) but as far as I could tell not more than once device at a time. Every time we started the car we had to select Sources -> Bluetooth -> Connect -> ${device name} -> Sources -> Bluetooth -> ${device name}. It was a huge hassle and a 3.5mm cable would have been far easier and sounded better.

chillacy 10y ago

So one interesting aspect of the airpods is seemingly automatic pairing, without having to dive in settings, through what seems like near-field communication. I'm curious to see if they've solved the multi-device pairing problem too.

mikeash 10y ago
The thing is, the pairing UI is rarely the problem. It's the actual pairing implementation. Pairing a phone to a car is usually just a few button presses. Not quite as convenient as NFC or whatever, but not a real problem. The problem arises when you find that Pair button and press it and then it doesn't work and provides no feedback on why it failed. Cue five minutes of screwing around turning things off and on again and finally giving up.
- chillacy 10y ago
  I'm lucky to not have had that experience for initial pairing. I was recently gifted the beats headphones and they've never had an issue like that, though I do have to re-pair with every device which is my main annoyance. I stopped using a BT trackpad because I would get disconnected randomly though, so maybe it comes down to the devices? Also not the first time we've had a chat in HN comments. How's the robot boxing chess league? ;)
  - mikeash 10y ago
    Devices no doubt play a part, and I think some of it is just dumb luck. Sometimes you might encounter a Bluetooth stack that's been wedged somehow, and it just won't go anywhere. A few weeks ago I was riding with my father and brother in my car, and they both wanted to play some music. We paired my brother's phone and all was well. Then we did my father's phone and we simply couldn't make it work despite a great deal of trying. They have the exact same iPhone model, but one worked and one didn't. A few days later we tried my father's phone again and it worked that time. No idea why. I almost said you had me confused with someone else, then I finally managed to remember that conversation. Where did we even talk about robot chess boxing? I remember discussing it in pretty alarming detail, but I can't remember where.
    - chillacy 10y ago
      I had to look it up, Lee Sedol vs AlphaGo, Man vs Machine: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11304985 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11304985 Almost half a year ago. Not sure how I remembered your name when I forget to pay my rent half the time, but that's my brain I guess.
      - mikeash 10y ago
        Thank you, now I can enjoy thinking about the tournament all over again.