Stopping Bluetooth speaker from reconnecting?

[gomezz]

In my bedroom I have a combined Bluetooth Speaker / Wireless Charger / Alarm Clock which I use to listen to audio from my tablet. However if I then turn Bluetooth off on my tablet then go downstairs and later want to listen to audio from my tablet on my living room Bluetooth radio I find that the bedroom speaker keeps grabbing the Bluetooth audio connection when I turn Bluetooth back on. I have to go into the Bluetooth connection settings on the tablet for the bedroom speaker to manually turn off the audio connection.

This is a bit of a faff and I was wondering if there was a way of automating this process. I tried using a Macrodroid macro to disconnect the bedroom speaker when there is another Bluetooth device connected but this does not stop the bedroom speaker reconnecting a few seconds later ending up in an eternal loop of connecting / disconnecting with the macro runnning. It is too late by then as the connect stops audio playback on the other device.

There is no way to turn off Bluetooth on the bedroom speaker (which would be the usual course of action) other than by unplugging it which stops it working as an alarm clock too. I am beginning to think I need to junk both it and my (non Bluetooth) bedroom radio and replace them with a Bluetooth radio / alarm clock unless someone can think of something else to try?

 

[SpookDroid]

Unfortunately that is a per-device behavior. If automating the connect/disconnect isn't cutting it because the speaker keeps trying to re-connect to the tablet, then yes, the only solution would be to either get a different speaker or to unpair the tablet every time you want to disconnect from the speaker.

 

[gomezz]

Thanks for confirming my suspicions that I am chasing my tail in trying to get it to behave the way I would like it to. Think I will stick with the manual disconnect method as I can't really justify the spend on a new Bluetooth radio / speaker just for that. Now if the damn thing would blow up on me then the budgetary case would strengthen.

Edit: Or I wonder if it would be possible to retrofit a switch to the Bluetooth circuitry power feed which would leave the rest of the functionality intact?

 

[gomezz]

Some more on the annoying behaviour of the bedroom Bluetooth Speaker: After connecting to my phone (rather than my tablet) I notice that the speaker continually tries to connect to the phone again even if Bluetooth is off and even if I unpair the phone from the speaker (I have a Macrodroid macro which posts a notification whenever a Bluetooth device disconnects as part of it automatically turning off Bluetooth when not in use at home).

The only way to stop it doing this I found was to let it connect to my tablet then disconnect. It seems that it is only trying to reconnect to the last device it was successfully connected. to.

Been looking around for a suitable one box solution to my bedroom needs but there is nothing which comes close to what I want: Large clock display for my de-spectacled eyes; Bluetooth; DAB+ radio; Display and controls on the front rather than on the top so I can see them while laying in bed; and finally the real killer - I need a line out to connect to my bedroom stereo for those frequent times I want more Oomph! A headphone socket does not do the job as it cuts out the speaker meaning I would need to continually be plugging and unplugging the lead to the stereo. Are my needs *that* unusual?

 

[gomezz]

Had another go at looking for a suitable box but this time majoring on the line out feature and seeing how close they are to meeting my other requirements. Seems I would mainly have to compromise on the size of the clock display and the overall size of which needs to be small enough to sit on my bedside table. Found a few but they are all upmarket and are way too much money to spend for what I want as they seem to be aimed at being the main entertainment centre in a living room.

Now thinking that I may bite the bullet on the line out feature and go for an inexpensive option I have found which does have a headphone output. Chewing it over ...

 

[Kizzy Catwoman]

It sounds like you are figuring things out slowly. Most cheap Bluetooth devices will auto pair with the last device it was connected to.

 

[gomezz]

Now *that* is another workaround. Use my old phone to be the device that is the last one connected to this speaker. But that is probably more of a faff than going to the tablet BT options and explicitly turned off audio connection.

More doable is moving even more to using my tablet only with that speaker and my mobile phone with all my other BT devices. I really got into the habit of using the tablet at home (and while out and about) as much as possible for media playback over BT as my old 2013 Windows Mobile phone used to eat battery like there was no tomorrow when it had BT turned on so used to be careful when and where I used it. With the S20 this is a non-problem.