Samsung R1 speaker review....great, but one annoying issue

Devices & Integrations Connected Things
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Samsung R1 speaker review….great so far, and one annoying issue

Overview…
As a quick overview, I purchased a Samsung R1, (Ebay/reconditioned for $55 (US)) to be used primarily for notifications and occasional music over wi-fi. My SmartThings use is primarily for Smart Home Monitor (in use for about 60 days), and a couple of Smart Lighting devices, (no custom code). The speaker connection to SmartThings using the Samung app with an Iphone was quick and easy. I am using “Speaker Notify with Sound”, and the “Speaker Weather Forecast” apps without any problems….no issues with text to talk. The Samsung app also works “OK” to play music from Iphone/Ipad via my wifi connection. Overall, I am very happy with the speaker purchase, and the way it’s functioning, other than the one issue below.

More in depth….
Bad news, the annoying issue…. Again, installation was really easy, (note that I did install with the old version of the app), and everything appeared ok. Later in the day, I decided to try the wifi music, and upon starting the app on my Iphone I was prompted to download a new version of the app. Once it was downloaded and opened there was a message to update the speaker software. I did the update, the wifi music worked, as well as a simple play of the weather forecast, (and back to the music). After about an hour of “easy listening”, I opened the ST app, and that’s when I saw that the speaker was “spamming” the activity log with messages….sometime as many as 10 messages per minute.
(Update: as I am writing this it seems to have changed to about twice per minute….better?)
2016-11-08 10:38:41.790 AM EST
moments ago DEVICE trackDescription – Samsung Speaker 1 track description is –
2016-11-08 10:38:40.764 AM EST
moments ago DEVICE trackDescription Samsung Speaker 1 track description is
2016-11-08 10:37:41.676 AM EST
moments ago DEVICE trackDescription – Samsung Speaker 1 track description is –
2016-11-08 10:37:40.634 AM EST
moments ago DEVICE trackDescription Samsung Speaker 1 track description is
2016-11-08 10:36:41.636 AM EST
moments ago DEVICE trackDescription – Samsung Speaker 1 track description is –
2016-11-08 10:36:40.701 AM EST
moments ago DEVICE trackDescription Samsung Speaker 1 track description is
2016-11-08 10:35:41.490 AM EST
moments ago DEVICE trackDescription – Samsung Speaker 1 track description is –
2016-11-08 10:35:40.566 AM EST
moments ago DEVICE trackDescription Samsung Speaker 1 track description is
2016-11-08 10:34:41.862 AM EST
moments ago DEVICE trackDescription – Samsung Speaker 1 track description is –
2016-11-08 10:34:40.952 AM EST
moments ago DEVICE trackDescription Samsung Speaker 1 track description is
2016-11-08 10:33:41.861 AM EST
6 minutes ago DEVICE trackDescription

Eventually, I went to the ST Community site and sure enough there was an existing thread about this issue. I emailed Samsung ST support and the issue had been previously reported. In short, they are “working on it” with the speaker support group. I can’t be positive, but I do not remember seeing the spamming until after I updated the speaker software,(good news is it did not “brick” my speaker)…… meanwhile, my activity log is impossible to review, and I do believe that all of the activity is slowing down the hub just a little.
The other thing that I’ve notice is that when using the speaker in Bluetooth, a wifi notification will interrupt the music, etc., but the speaker does not return to Bluetooth…that’s really not an issue for me.

Good news….I am really happy with how everything, (except above issue), is working. A great $55 investment. Response time is about a 1 maybe 2 second delay in the notification from the event. I usually arm SHM with a Minimote, and it is nice hearing the arm/disarm confirmations. The “barking dogs” alarm is a great addition to my siren….although it does scare our dog and cat. One other thing I’ve done is to put a first activity of the day “sensor working” notification on each of the sensors used by SHM. I have 2 motion and 3 doors sensors, so between 6:00am and 10:00am with the alarm disarmed and in home mode, the first activity on each sensor triggers a voice “sensor working” notification. This does two things….verifies that the sensor is working, and gives me some idea of the ‘response’ time. I feel that after the “gee whiz” factor wears off I will change that to a weekly process.

Overall I am a “happy camper”, but patiently awaiting a fix to the spamming issue.
My $.02

2 Likes
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Spamming has definitely stopped, but it appears now that ST is sending a “set volume to 0” before the message is completed, (using “Notify with Sound”) and cutting off the message.

Reported to ST.

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Ah, I was wondering because when I tested I never heard anything.

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With the “Notify with Sound” app you should hear something…it just cuts off mid sentence. Also the “Speaker Weather Forecast” seems to be more reliable than the TTS, but not always…it too gets truncated sometimes.

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So, I had the exact same problem as you but here’s how I fixed it. (At least in Core.) Instead of ‘speak text’ I switched to ‘speak text and resume’ and then that fixed the problem. No longer truncates audio. No idea what the difference is or why it did it, but it works.

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Thanks, I may have to go that way, but I’ve been trying to stay away from custom code solutions for at least a while. Right now I justified this as a replacement for my security system, but as venture more toward the HA side I’m sure I’ll get into Core and custom code.

I’m not really against it, but more that if Samsung/ST is going to advertise/sell supported functions the they should actually SUPPORT them.

Again, I really appreciate you posting the solution you found, and thanks for the reply.

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A temporary fix for the volume drop here…