Playing internet radio on the move?

[Canalsman]

The apps all have a buffer to cover brief interruptions in receiving data. The bigger the buffer the longer they will play before giving up. However the bigger the buffer the longer it takes for the app to start playing.

It's a compromise.

One thing that may help is to disable 5G on the phone. 5G is inherently less stable due to the much shorter range of the cell tower transmissions.

I have disabled 5G on my phone because 4G offers sufficient performance for anything that I do.

 

[ProDave]

Obvious question

What 2 stations?

Classic Rock Florida https://classicrockflorida.com/
Radio Caroline https://www.radiocaroline.co.uk/

Both play on the phone okay from their own players but don't re start after loss of signal.

I can find the URL of the direct stream for each to play through any player that will work and continue after loss of signal.

It seems such a basic requirement of a mobile device that it will loose signal so you will want it to re start when the signal comes back. I am staggered if I am the first to find this problem and be seeking a solution. But I can't find much discussion about it anywhere.

 

[richardat]

My favourite

Radio Paradise's Main Mix

Dj-mixed modern & classic rock, electronic, world music, and more. An eclectic musical adventure.

radioparadise.com

 

[Bushellj]

My 2 favourite radio stations are only available on line. Fine I can play them on my phone and bluetooth that to the car radio or Sonos in the 'van. That works fine while stationary, but in the move, if ,my phone loses signal then re gains signal, the player does not re start. So totally unworkable.

So my question is does anyone know a particular player app or other way to play a streaming internet radio station on a phone (android) in such a way that when the phone regains signal it will just start playing again on it's own without user intervention please.

We have used an Amazon Echo Auto with great success and use this all the time in our van. Also provides a hands free capability for the mobile phone.

 

[maingate]

Why not just pre record some music and play it back while driving?

Sometimes the old fashioned ways are forgotten.

On a personal note, if I am driving, I never use a radio or any other device to distract me.

 

[ProDave]

Some progress.

Following finding good reviews elsewhere I have installed the Audials app. I have tried it at home as much as I can. Phone wifi turned off the set it playing. Put phone in metal glove box of my classic car, it lost signal and stopped playing. Took phone out, it regained signal and re started (took about 30 seconds)

I have tried it on a short trip and it worked okay.

Will try it in due course on a longer trip.

 

[winks]

Some progress.

Following finding good reviews elsewhere I have installed the Audials app. I have tried it at home as much as I can. Phone wifi turned off the set it playing. Put phone in metal glove box of my classic car, it lost signal and stopped playing. Took phone out, it regained signal and re started (took about 30 seconds)

I have tried it on a short trip and it worked okay.

Will try it in due course on a longer trip.

Another one that I use, and has not dropped so far, is Tidal. Not radio streaming but very reliable.

Cheers

H

 

[Okta]

My favourite

Radio Paradise's Main Mix

Dj-mixed modern & classic rock, electronic, world music, and more. An eclectic musical adventure.

radioparadise.com

My favourite too.

You can download hours and hours of streaming before you leave home. No problem with continuity of signal and saves on data charges. They also offer a lossless stream that gives proper audio quality.

Edit. No ads and no charges.

 

[Pudsey Bear]

I have loads of music on my phone I can play, but the point of a radio station, especially the 2 I like most, they have a much bigger play list than me and someone else chooses and I get to hear new stuff, or stuff I have not heard in ages and forgotten about.

That makes sense, I have loads of MP3s, but after a while unless you're on shuffle, you know what's coming next.

I confess to liking the randomness of radio, if you can find a station to your liking, that is.

 

[ProDave]

Thinking about this more, and why I want this, it's something to listen to while away or on a long journey. It does not have to be "live" it's not as though there is an hourly up to date news bulletin on this channel. So I am going to set my phone to record overnight for few nights, so we have a selection of stored long recordings to play, so we don't even need a phone signal to play them.

 

[Pudsey Bear]

Good idea, not sure how to do that, but you could maybe record different stations, and save them as MP3s to save space.

 

[ProDave]

Good idea, not sure how to do that, but you could maybe record different stations, and save them as MP3s to save space.

I didn't know how to do it before, but it is a built in feature of audials player. So I have set it to record 10 hours overnight when my phone will be on charge and connected to the wifi and will let it keep doing that until I have a number of 10 hour long sessions recorded.

I did a short test and the recording can be replayed through audials or any other player of your choice.

 

[Pudsey Bear]

Sounds good, it might convert on the fly too then as 10 hours will be a lot of data, it would take a lot of space, over 10gb an hour I'd guess, maybe more.

 

[Okta]

Thinking about this more, and why I want this, it's something to listen to while away or on a long journey. It does not have to be "live" it's not as though there is an hourly up to date news bulletin on this channel. So I am going to set my phone to record overnight for few nights, so we have a selection of stored long recordings to play, so we don't even need a phone signal to play them.

With Radio Paradise it only takes a few minutes to download a couple of hours of music, which is then cached to listen to later. You can pile up the caches to last for weeks of travelling.

 

[trevskoda]

Why not just pre record some music and play it back while driving?

Sometimes the old fashioned ways are forgotten.

On a personal note, if I am driving, I never use a radio or any other device to distract me.

Same here, no radio when on the hoof.
Record usb and play on a usb transmitter to radio.

 

[ProDave]

Sounds good, it might convert on the fly too then as 10 hours will be a lot of data, it would take a lot of space, over 10gb an hour I'd guess, maybe more.

I will see in the morning how big the file is. Then decide how to continue.

 

[ProDave]

I changed last nights recording to just 1 hour to assess the file size. It came out at 55MB. So I will let tonights recording go ahead at 10 hours which should be about 0.5GB

At that sort of file size playing for any duration using mobile data could put a big dent in your monthly allowance, so the record off line from unlimited broadband seems a better idea.