Is there such a thing as "selective bluetooth?

[ShaggyKids]

Not sure selective is the right word but it's the one that came to mind.

I prefer to use my Gear S remotely connected almost 100% of the time. When I get into my car my Ford Sync now asks me to connect a phone where previously it automatically connected when all I had was my phone and no Gear S.

In order to connect of course I have to turn on Bluetooth on my phone which then turns on the Bluetooth connection between my phone and my Gear S and my phone and Gear are connected via Bluetooth rather than remotely.

In order to run the watch on a remote connection Bluetooth must be off.

Does anyone know of a way that the Bluetooth connection can be automatic for my car to phone connection and leave my Gear S out of the equation?

The reason I would like to do this is that it's just annoying to have to manually turn on bluetooth to connect my phone to my car when I never had to do this before got my Gear S.

Guilty of being spoiled rotten.

Thanks much,
Deb

 

[pre1561]

I just let my truck connect to either one or both. My phone stays on a windshield mount so I can see it. My watch is connected to my phone, I have no idea if my Gear S is connecting to my truck or not but it doesn't really matter to me. I also now have BT hearing aids that connect to my Gear S and my phone but not my truck. All of those connection's just let me choose wich to answer when I get a call.

Sent from my SM-N910P using Tapatalk

 

[foxbat121]

Deb,

Can't you just turn off the BT on the watch?

pre1561,

When Gear S is BT connected to a phone, it won't try to maintain a connection to any BT headset/hands free devices because you actually can't pickup phone calls from those BT devices connected to Gear S in this mode. So, in the case of your truck, it probably will just auto connect to your phone instead in which case you can choose pickup calls either from watch or from truck/phone.

 

[ShaggyKids]

You would think so but I've just tried that again and when I disconnect it using the gear manager it just shows disconnected. If I turn off Bluetooth in the notification bar then then watch shows remotely connected. The remote connection is checkmarks in the gear manager, I think I'm missing a setting somewhere.

 

[alan44]

i think he means simply turn the bluetooth off on the watch via settings /connections/BT on the watch - you're still "remotely connected" via samsung / 3g if both devices are on - just as happens when you're out of BT range --- leaving the phone free to connect to your car BT ??
presumably you could do it the other way round if you want the watch to be the BT device for the car but the phone is with you in close proximity say in your handbag -- sorry briefcase

... and all of this is done without changing the settings in "Gear Manager" ??

 

[foxbat121]

Correct. Turn off BT on the watch. Don't disconnect on the Gear Manager. Otherwise, your watch will not re-connect by itself until you manually re-connect the watch in the Gear Manager again.

 

[ShaggyKids]

OMG! Never thought of that but looks like it works that way! I'll test a few more times but I think you got it!

 

[ShaggyKids]

Still working thanks for your genius!

 

[alan44]

well unlike the other poster I'm still in the dumbhead class and have shared many of your difficulties and frustrations

But I know a good thing when I see one and have tried to adopt a stick with it, wait and see and go with the flow approach - which seems to be working - the practical functionality of the device seems to be improving day by day (self organising complexity?) and there seems to be nothing on the horizon that will do the same or better, or be free from the constraints of a locked-in ecosytem and /or the need to have a master device - at least with samsung your master device can be left plugged in at home

I'm still somewhat underwhelmed and confused by the interface on the samsung phone - e.g. Flipboard / Briefing / Story Album etc
what is all that? I understand I have to have the phone to make the Gear S work but i just want phone / text / messaging /email /contacts / calendar / tasks / maps - not another "me" centred personal social media hub

If Samsung could put a GSM aerial & sim card (or card slot for the same - I read there are potential in-built obsolescence or international incompatibility considerations constraining that) into one of their laptops, make that compatible with Gear Manager and the Gear S ( i dunno maybe on a separate partition alongside the windows OS?) I'd be completely sold. 1 laptop + 1 smart/telephone/watch. Cutting edge retro simplicity versus drowning in a sea of devices / platforms / dongles / wires etc

 

[foxbat121]

It won't even work with their Android tablets with SIM cards. Forget about PCs. Software is not exactly Samsung's strong point. They know how to push envelop in hardware design but always lags behind in software side.

 

[alan44]

yeah I did think that was a bit optimistic - so my use case will have to be Gear S + compatible Samsung phone + whatever laptop