Click here to hear an MP3 of a ringtone that
I made from scratch:
http://telefog.com/ringtone
It's 30 seconds long, which matches the
length of the ring cycle for most phones.
In chronological order, it consists of:
- 4 tones of 0.1 seconds each, separated
by 3 silences of 0.1 seconds each
- a 9.5-second silence
- 3 tones of the type in the first burst
- a 9.5-second silence
- 2 tones of the type in the first burst
- a 9.5-second silence
- 1 tone of the type in the first burst
(All durations are approximate.)
I think that the virtues of this ringtone are:
- It's distinctive: in a roomful
of phones, you'd recognize this
ring because no one else would have
it.
- It's button-downed: the tones are
identical and don't suggest any
song.
- It's restrained: the ringtone consists
mainly of silence, so even if you couldn't
answer a phone that was using this ringtone,
it would not annoy the hell out of most
people within earshot.
- The 4-3-2-1 pattern tells you
about how long you have to answer the
phone before it reverts to voicemail.
For example, when you hear the 2-tone
burst, you'd know that you have about
10 seconds left before the call goes
to voicemail.
I composed the ringtone using Motorola's
iMelody utility, which used to come installed
on Motorola's Verizon and Cingular models.
Verizon phased out iMelody a couple of years
ago, and it looks like Cingular is phasing
right now. I used a Cingular Motorola V557,
and nearly all Cingular RAZRs have iMelody,
too. Your phone might have iMelody without
you realizing it; poke around your Motorola's
menus. The iMelody tone sequence for the
ringtone that I created is:
*5g5r4*5g5r4*5g5r4*5g5r4r2r1r1r1r1r1r1r1r1r1*5g5r4 *5g5r4*5g5r4r2r1r1r1r1r1r*
1r1r1r1*5g5r4*5g5r4r2r1r1r1r1r1r1r1r1r1*5g5r1r1
That would look like gibberish until you
use iMelody to compose; you'd understand
it eventually. "*5g5" means a tone of
octave 5, note g, duration 1/5 of a second.
"r" means rest of duration 1 second ("1"),
1/2 second ("2"), or 1/4 second ("4").
(However, those durations don't all match
the durations in the finished product, and
I don't know why. But the ringtone works as
I want it to.)
The terminating "r1r1" is a buffer to prevent
the ringtone from starting over at the beginning
in the event that the ring cycle runs over
30 seconds.
Please note that the various versions
of iMelody over the years have had differing
syntax, so you might have to experiment
to determine the syntax on your phone.
I don't fully understand iMelody's syntax,
so feel free to flesh things out. IMelody
is discussed in Motorola's user manuals
either incompletely or not at all.
What do you think of this ringtone?
**********
1366294709
A restrained ringtone, created from scratch 
Linear Mode
