WARBL Forum

Hello!

Has anyone else been having constant issues since the last warbl app update? It still never connects without wifi and now it will either constantly lose connection with my whistle or the app will just crash. It ruined 4 gigs over St Paddy’s as I use it to not have to mic a whistle with the full band. Unfortunately, I had to stand there twiddling my thumbs during half of our sets because it wouldn’t connect. I have replaced the USB to lightning cable as well as the usb mini (or micro or whatever end the warbl uses) and it is still refusing to connect for more than 8 seconds before either disconnecting or crashing the entire app.

Any trouble shooting tips would be greatly appreciated as I am now on my last chance with the band after ruining our entire weekend of gigs.

I’m sorry to hear about these issues. I’ll talk to the guys who made the app and see if they have any suggestions. In general I recommend having your settings all configured ahead of time so you don’t have to use the WARBL app in a live setting. If you do need to change settings I’d suggest setting up different instruments so you can swap between them with a button action, or use button actions to change individual settings.

I need to have the app going so that I can connect my whistle at the start, but I do switch between the three tabs so that I can use the whistle, the Uilleann pipes, and the highland pipes. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get past getting the app to recognize the whistle so I couldn’t play anything through it. I tried it at each gig and just today at my house with perfect wifi, new cables, and new connectors. Unfortunately, even in this “lab” setting, it still wasn’t working so I currently have a full setup that is essentially a paperweight haha

Okay, thanks—could you tell me what device and iOS version you are using? This is the first I’ve heard of this issue.

When you say that you need to have the WARBL app going to connect the whistle at the start, what do you mean by that? The WARBL should connect to any MIDI app without needing to use the Configuration Tool.

I am on a 9th generation iPad that I bought brand new a couple years ago when I bought the whistle. I am running iOS 15.3.1.

I have never been able to pull open Celtic sounds and start playing prior to opening the configuration tool and clicking the yellow “connect to warbl” button.

Oh, that’s very strange! The WARBL app shouldn’t have any affect on the ability to connect with other apps. I rarely use the WARBL app because I tend to use the same settings all the time.

If you have a chance it would be interesting to download the MIDI Wrench app (free) and then play the WARBL with that app open (without opening the WARBL app) and see if it receives messages from the WARBL. I can’t think why Celtic Sounds wouldn’t connect, but I’ll ponder this. MIDI Wrench might give us some clues.

One other question—if you wiggle the various connections between the WARBL/adapter/cable, does the LED on the WARBL ever flash? This almost sounds more like a hardware issue, especially if you’ve had problems connecting to other apps and the WARBL app sometimes disconnects spontaneously.

I do have the midi wrench app, as we were using it to try and figure out why it had continuous signal coming through when I tried to use the midi Bluetooth device.

It doesn’t flash often. I notice it every now and again but mostly just when I plug in or push the button to send signal (when hoping to get the app to recognize that the whistle exists)

Okay, if you just plug in the WARBL and open MIDI Wrench, does it recognize the WARBL and display MIDI messages when you start playing?

According to the midiwrench it is the connector of the cable to the whistle. I can watch it register and not depending on how the cable is moving around inside the whistle. I tried to tape it prior to this (just so it didn’t slip out while playing) but apparently it just isn’t fully connecting in there either. Is there any upgrades to have a USB C or Apple connector on the whistle since those connectors seem to fit snugly?