Our Samsung TV* and our Samsung soundbar/woofer no longer connect over bluetooth. Well, they do connect—both displays say they are connected—but the TV only plays through its own speakers. I called Samsung for help with this, but the phone maze robot said only texts would work at that time. Here’s the text monologue from Samsung:
We will get you to the next agent as soon as possible. Your wait time is 27 Minutes and there are 90 customers ahead of you.
Apologies, due to abnormally high volumes, it is taking longer than expected to connect you to an agent. As soon as someone is available, we will connect you.
Thank you. You are connected with Theo James S from Samsung Care
Hello! Welcome to Samsung Technical support, This is Theo and I’m here to assist you. What can I do for you today?
It looks like you may be away. If you’d like to continue, simply send me a message, and I’ll be here to help.
Hello! Your support case is scheduled to close soon. If we have not resolved your issue yet, please respond to this message. Our Samsung Care Pros are available 24/7!
Survey has expired – Thank you for your feedback. Any time you need assistance, simply respond to this message. We’re here to support you, 24/7!
I gave up in the middle of that by getting help from ChatGPT that isolated the problem: The Bluetooth radios have successfully negotiated identity and relationship but failed to agree on purpose. In other words, they’re married but not speaking.
It suggested that I make an optical connection and give up on Bluetooth. Specifically, If optical works, I’d call the matter settled. If it doesn’t, then I would start suspecting the soundbar itself rather than the TV, because you’ve already done more systematic debugging than most first-line Samsung support agents would attempt.
So I ordered one of these from Amazon for $6.29. It will be here tomorrow, and we’ll see if the problem persists.
Meanwhile, we have a good example of the business challenge Nitin Badjatia has been writing about.
*This is the only link online to the TV we have. We bought it from Amazon about a year ago, for less than the $849 Walmart is asking at that link. We got is slightly old (2024) model because for the space where we wanted it, 43″ was the right size, and for picture quality we wanted 4K OLED. Samsung no longer offered 4K OLEDs in sizes under 55 inches. (Here’s their current product spread.) Nor does anybody, I think. Wall-sized TVs are now The Thing.
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