iPhone 5s doesn't play the assigned ringtone.

Question

Level 1

4 points

iPhone 5s doesn't play the assigned ringtone.

Hi All,

I just recently got an iPhone 5s, upgraded from my iPhone 4.

Yesterday, I created some custom melodies in Garage Band (on the iPhone itself) and exported them as ringtone sounds. Ringtone export is possible from Garage Band.

I assigned the sounds to what I wanted: Ringtone, Text, Calendar, Email, Reminders . . . etc . . . in the main 'Sounds' menu. I did not assign any sounds to specific contacts.

Yesterday, the sounds worked perfectly when someone tried to call, text, or even send a meeting request.

Today, however, the iPhone 5s is using the default sounds it uses from the factory settings.

The odd thing is, the main 'Sounds' menu still shows my custom sounds assigned. And, when you try to assign them again you do hear the preview. So the sounds seem to be present on the iPhone 5s.

I noticed that when you assign any of the internal sounds, they work properly.

What is it, all of sudden, about my custom sounds that the iPhone 5s doesn't like? They worked yesterday and not today.

HELP!

- Adrian

iPhone 5s, iOS 7.0.4

Posted on Feb 8, 2014 4:43 PM

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Answer 1

balboa76

Level 1

4 points

Nov 11, 2017 9:40 PM in response to Berbyq

AWESOME, AWESOME, AWESOME...YOU'RE A BEAUTIFUL PERSON BERBYQ!!!!!!!! I just recently purchased an 7 Plus and have been dealing with this issue ever since 😠...It's very annoying since I live by my alarms set as reminders and I do have MANY of them 😉 None of them would play my purchased ringtone downloaded straight from iTunes. You just made this person one of the HAPPIEST Apple users and tremendously helped shed some of my overall disgust with my iPhone! THANK YOU SO VERY MUCH BERBYQ AS WELL AS THAT VERY "TODAY IN iOS" PODCAST!!!!

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Answer 2

ChrisJ4203

Level 10

230,347 points

Feb 8, 2014 4:46 PM in response to marsi00

Try going into Settings>Notification Center, and check the individual areas you are trying to change. It seems that settings in Notification Center can override changes in Sounds, and sometimes will not reflect the changes you made there.

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Answer 3

marsi00 Author

Level 1

4 points

Feb 8, 2014 4:57 PM in response to ChrisJ4203

Thanks, but already checked that. They are all assigned accordingly in the Notifications menu.

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Answer 4

ChrisJ4203

Level 10

230,347 points

Feb 8, 2014 4:59 PM in response to marsi00

What troubleshooting have you tried? Have you tried a reset on the phone? It does not affect data. Just hold the sleep/wake and home buttons together until you see the Apple logo and then release. The phone will reboot. See if that corrects your issue.

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Answer 5

marsi00 Author

Level 1

4 points

Feb 8, 2014 5:29 PM in response to ChrisJ4203

Thanks once again.

Just tried the hard reset and no dice.

I checked to see if the sounds were assigned, they are. I got my wife to text me. The sounds are still playing the factory set sounds.

I have a feeling that it has to do with the ringtones I from Garage Band.

All of the other factory sounds can be assigned . . . and they work.

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Answer 6

ChrisJ4203

Level 10

230,347 points

Feb 8, 2014 5:42 PM in response to marsi00

Just to make sure, the tones you created were less than 30 seconds in length, correct?

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Answer 7

marsi00 Author

Level 1

4 points

Feb 8, 2014 5:54 PM in response to ChrisJ4203

Yes. All the sounds are 2-3 seconds long.

And again, they were working perfectly yesterday. I'm not sure what changed. I can't think of anything that I did that might alter the functionality of the sounds.

Very odd behaviour.

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Answer 8

marsi00 Author

Level 1

4 points

Feb 8, 2014 6:05 PM in response to marsi00

Might I have to sync with iTunes?

I just noticed . . . I brought over some of my old ringtones (from iTunes) that I created a long while ago - for my iPhone 4.

They show up and work when assigned.

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Answer 9

ChrisJ4203

Level 10

230,347 points

Feb 8, 2014 6:07 PM in response to marsi00

Yes, odd indeed. If you created them on the iPhone, a sync should not matter. At this point though, I would be willing to try anything.

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Answer 10

marsi00 Author

Level 1

4 points

Feb 8, 2014 7:06 PM in response to ChrisJ4203

Okay, I fixed it.

I ended up having to do a RESET ALL in the General menu. This ended up resetting all of my preferences and notifications. But, when I changed my sounds, they worked. I had my wife send me a text and the proper sound played.

Now I need to spend an hour setting all my preferences again. :p

But I still don't know what would have caused this behaviour. If it happens again, and I can figure out what it was that caused it. I'll definitely post it.

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Answer 11

ChrisJ4203

Level 10

230,347 points

Feb 8, 2014 7:08 PM in response to marsi00

Okay, sounds good.

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Answer 12

marsi00 Author

Level 1

4 points

Feb 16, 2014 9:28 AM in response to ChrisJ4203

Okay . . . it has happend again!

My phone has randomly started to play the factory set ringtones and text tones - even though I have other tones selected. No idea why.

Again, all my ringtone and alert tones are set to my desired settings - but they do not play. My desired tones are little melodies that I created and exported as ringtones from Garage Band on my iPhone.

I don't want to have to do a reset all again - it's going to take way too long to setup my custom settings.

Why does this happen?

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Answer 13

Waihsing

Level 1

0 points

Apr 20, 2014 5:30 PM in response to marsi00

Hi!

I have the exact problem on my iPhone 5S. I delete the ringtone and re-export it from GarageBand iOS to get it working. After a while, it goes back to factory settings.

As far as I know, all my other custom ringtones do have this problem except the ones created by GarageBand iOS and export directly to iPhone.

Help?

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Answer 14

May 11, 2014 12:56 AM in response to marsi00

Iv had exactly the same issue and iv found something interesting on this it seems that most of the tutorials are misleading getting you to set the amount of bars to 30 which isnt 30seconds. When creating a tone of any length make sure the amount of bars does not exceed 30 seconds. The easiest way is to time your tone with a stopwatch and to be sure stop at 28seconds. I found for my ringtone 13bars was 30seconds but it will vary depending on songs tempo i assume. So set bar length accordingly and your tones should now work indefinitely hope that helped its been doing my head in for weeks :)

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Answer 15

May 19, 2014 11:57 AM in response to marsi00

Hi I don't know you resolved your problem, but i will tell how i did it anyway. (It might help somehow)

I had the same problem as you today. I sent my new ringtone to my iphone. Even though i chose that song when receiving my emails, it was my old ringtone that was playing.

After reading and applying all the help on this discussion board and failing. i tried one last thing.

I usually use my Itunes to transfer and back up my files. So before i hooked up my iphone to my computer, I went to the "sounds" or "ringtone" panel on my Itunes app. (Sorry if i use wrong terms. I'm using another language interface for Itunes). Found the sound that was causing me problems (my old ringtone) and deleted it from Itunes but not the computer.

I then synced it again and I made sure my new ringtone was designated for my emails in the sound tab and notification center of my iphone. And it works.

I then, re-added my old ringtone to Itunes. And next time i will sync it again. Hopefully, it will still be the new ringtone playing on my emails.

Best of luck

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