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My first Working streaming audio

lordofthereef

lordofthereef

macrumors G5
Original poster
Nov 29, 2011
13,161
3,721
Boston, MA
I wanted to share my thoughts, experiences, and grievances with my first day streaming audio working out. Some things you should know:

- Series 3 42mm stainless steel
- workout consisted of indoor run
- workout lasted exactly one hour
- streaming was free radio consisting of various channels
- watch was charged to 100% and ended at 94%

My biggest gripe absolutely has to be buffering. Be it on wifi or LTE, I was constantly seeing buffering anywhere from 30 seconds to 2 minutes. A few times the audio wouldn't come back without being manually restarted. I tried toggling things, I even shut my phone completely off as I was worried it may be somehow trying to connect directly to the phone. While I can't really test reception on the watch (afaik?) I get 10ms pings and 120+ megabit down on my 6s plus.

I haven't been an Apple music member, which is why I didn't try that. I currently use google music and figured I'd give this a test run before switching over. So far I am not impressed by much aside from the battery life (though how impressive is that really with me having sat buffering easily 25% of the time?).

I welcome other thoughts. I am going to go on a run outdoors tomorrow; tonight was a late night trick or treating with my son and by the time I updated the phone it was 39 degrees (F) out (yeah, yeah, I know people run in colder weather but I am not those people lol).
 
Had my outdoor run today. Same thing. Anyone have this working falwelssly? Surprised I have had zero resonses...
 
Hmm. That’s a bummer. I’ll be inter eyed in other responses as well. Just got my S3 today, but I can’t activate LTE so can’t test that.
 
Did an outdoor run today of just under 45 minutes. Radio worked flawlessly, with no buffering and fairly fast initial connections, listening to NPR, BBC, and CBS News. I was able to switch station easily mid-run. This was with Nike running app working at the same time. But it all took a big hit on the battery -- it went down from somewhere in the nineties to 55%. I suspect that the OP was streaming over wifi, which accounts for his much better battery experience.
 
I wasn't streaming over wifi. In fact I had wifi turned off. I didn't, however, have GPS, since it was a treamill run. perhaps that is the big difference? Again, also worth nothing that I didn't have audio for at least half the time. Didn't feel like dealing with it today. Ran inside and just used my phone. :(
 
lordofthereef said:
Had my outdoor run today. Same thing. Anyone have this working falwelssly? Surprised I have had zero resonses...
Click to expand...

I had it working flawlessly today. I went for two outdoor walks today (15 minutes each) and had it streaming from one of my playlists not downloaded to the watch. It never missed lagged or buffered and when skipping songs the next song started right away.
 
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jekim said:
I had it working flawlessly today. I went for two outdoor walks today (15 minutes each) and had it streaming from one of my playlists not downloaded to the watch. It never missed lagged or buffered and when skipping songs the next song started right away.
Click to expand...
Well dang, now I am curious if the issue is with the watch or...?
Bad time to need an Apple appointment
 
Yea I also am getting the perfect experience with zero buffering time - did a 30 minute outdoor run using LTE and was blown away by the radio app.
 
Flawless radio streaming on my run. However the battery was hit HARD. Thankfully I was watching battery life and switched to a stored playlist.
 
For me there was only a 4 percent difference from my normal synced playlist to the Workout Rock radio, I’m guessing Beats1 would be hit harder, not sure how much of a live radio the music ones are versus Beats1?

I went on a 30 minute run and went from 100 to 86 instead of my normal 100 to 90 percent.
 
Was out for a little over 45 minutes walk today, used the Radio exclusively the whole time. Battery started at 63% and ended at 38%. I had GPS turned on and also received one notification while out. No buffering even while skipping.
 
I’m just gonna restore the watch. I’ve had battery issues since luring with the X, or maybe just since 4.1 IDK.

I’ve never been the guy to hold off on updates. Possibly regretting that part of me lol. Oh well. We will see.
 
lordofthereef said:
I’m just gonna restore the watch. I’ve had battery issues since luring with the X, or maybe just since 4.1 IDK.

I’ve never been the guy to hold off on updates. Possibly regretting that part of me lol. Oh well. We will see.
Click to expand...
So I went ahead and restore since I’ve been having battery issues. Everything is fine now including the battery. How very very strange.

On a positive note restoring took just a few minutes. I was dreading the restore from previous AW experiences lol.
 
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