Stand-alone infrared Control

[johnwpb]

Well, I couldnt find a good place to put this post other than here. It is not really a scipting or plugin question for say, so here goes.

I have a few Fujitsu 1600's and would like to use one of them as a stand alone IR controller. The Fujitsu has a built in IR port. I want to be able to design a graphical screen, as an example, with channel logo's for instance to "touch" to change to that channel.

The Fujitsu 1600 is running Windows 98 Second edition.

I know Netremote, Girder and such can send commands to a server and route to IR transmitters ect. I would like to do this all with simply the Fujitsu using it's built in IR transmitter. Of course the sollution will need to be able to learn remote control codes from existing remotes.

Any help on this is appreceiated.

[independentpete]

John: I don't have the Fujitsu device, but if its IR is like that of laptops it's probably only good for a distance of about 6 feet. You'll probably be very disappointed after all the effort of trying to make it work. May I recommend using the Fujitsu to send an HS command via Wifi network to HS and HS sending it as an IR command via an Ocelot or similar device.

[Rupp]

The ir on my laptop will only reach about 12" when I'm transferring images from my phone.

[Chas821]

John,

There is a world of difference between the IrDA Port on the 1600 and Consumer IR (used for AV device control). The IR protocols are grossly different. There but a few devices (PDAs) that can go both ways. I don't believe that the IR port on the 1600, even with the right software, will do what you want. Search for information on the I-Appliance BBS/Fujitsu discussions here.

[hanarmco]

JohnWPB, it may not be the answer that you are looking for, but for stand alone IR you can't beat the One-For-All JP1 combination. They are very inexpensive and quite powerful -- under $35 for the remote and cable. They are also completely user programmable through a PC and JP1.

I started out using an Ocelot and HS to control my HT/Entertainment center and ultimately switched to an OFA/JP1. I am much happier now because, among other things, of its ability to instantly execute macros (probably 20x times the Ocelot) and you have immediate control over Vol+/-, Channel changes and etc. You can also trigger HS events by using an IR543 (IR to x10) or IR recognition on some other HS supported device.

More information here with some screenshots of how to program it.

[johnwpb]

THanks for all the replies, dosent look like I'm gonna be able to do it the way I wanted after all.

Jon, Ok can you give me a little more info on the JP1 you are talking about? This sounds like a good route to go. I read something about a serial cable connected from a PC to an all for one remote dirrectly. Is this what you are talking about?

I just didnt want to put the Fujitsu in the setup mention above:

Set up a wireless network, Set up girder to work with it on HS, Setup NetRemote or something to send the command from the Fujitsu, From there route the command out to an ocelot from HS, to finally send the command to the TV. The lag time would be just unacceptable for normal channel surfing and volume control. That setup would work fine for macros, like "Watch DVD" where speed isnt of the greatest neccessity for it to send all the commands to set everything up.

[hanarmco]

A number of remotes made by UEI and sold under One-For-All (OFA) and some Radio Shack models have a 6-pin connector in the battery compartment known as JP1. The JP1 connector can be interfaced to the parallel (or less commonly the USB) interface of PC in order to program the remote. The group that reverse engineered the JP1 interface developed software that communicates with the OFA's EEPROM. There are also a series of tools to decode IR commands found that are posted at Remote Central for the Philips Pronto and additional software to add those IR commands to the OFA remotes with a device and protocol upgrade. The user forums are:

http://www.hifi-remote.com/forums/

There are links as the top of the various forums to the relevant tools and files.

There are tools that can alter the way the remote itself works and allow for programming keys to issue different macros depending on whether you use a long or short button press and so forth. With very few exceptions using the advanced tools will allow assigning any function to any key an override a built in key function. You also can assign functions to shifted-keys and macros to the device key itself. Most of us set the remote up such that if you press the DVD key the TV (or display) turns On is set to the DVD input, ditto for the AV receiver, DVD on.

There are JP1 files where device upgrades are posted that add devices like projectors and a wide variety of other equipment that are seldom in any universal remotes.

An example of how I used an OFA remote in conjunction with HS was a Toshiba TV that only had a power toggle. I had a video sensor that would tell HS the status of the TV and an event in HS called "TV On" that would turn the TV on only if it was off.

I triggered that HS event with an x10 command from an IR543 that can detect x10 IR commands and send a powerline x10 command.

On the OFA remote I had a macro that sent the x10 IR command (to cause HS to turn the TV On if not on already), then IR commands to turn on and set the AV receiver to the correct input, etc.

Since the AV receiver, DVD, DSS receiver, VCR had discrete power commands; I triggered those with the OFA remote.

That leads to very fast execution time of the Macro and doesn't overload the Ocelot with a bunch of IR commands. At the end of all macros the OFA remote is set to the correct device mode and volume control sets the receiver. In my HT setup I control 13 different devices (video switchers or x10 just require a few commands and most of those are set within macros)

You can also control lighting directly with the IR543 or have it trigger an event within HS.

[bruce l]

I have a OFA J1 remote. It is nice to set it up from the PC instead of trying to figure out all the stupid 999 codes to assign functions.

I found the software a bit confusing at 1st to setup with new devices but very easy to arrainge the new fuctions to buttons or to go back and changed them later to different buttons. That was the hardest part of using non-JP1 remotes was when you wanted to change the setup you could not easily tell what function each button had been assigned. And I keep terrible notes

[zoomkat]

I looked at the OFA JP1 info a long time back and it was used just for changing the programming in the remoter. At that time it would not support having a computer send a control signal to the remote and the remote output the IR to a device. Has this changed to allow the computer to control realtime the remote control?

[rocco]

Zoomkat, I don't think that particular limitation can be overcome. The reason is that OFA JP1 uses an HC05 microprocessor to control the IR, with an I2C EEProm to hold the IR programming. The JP1 cable holds the microcontroller in reset, so that the computer can directly read/write the EEProm by bit-twiddling the I2C pins. The operation of the microcontroller is thereby mutually exclusive to operation of the computer interface.

[hanarmco]

zoomkat and rocco, you are correct the only thing that the PC can do with a JP1 remote is read and write to the EEPROM. The PC cannot cause it to send commands. So you can only program them, upgrade the Device and Protocol library, and save your configuration with a PC.

There were some earlier OFA remotes that had a three pin serial interface that could be controlled by a PC. But at the time, no one figured out how to upgrade them. They are now so far out of production that no one has spent the time trying to hack them.

The guts of those remotes are apparently in the Smarthome HouseLinc that I recently figured out how to make JP1 compatible since the same CPU and EEPROM are in one of the oldest JP1 remotes and someone recently posted a schematic. Here is a link:
http://ubb.homeseer.com/eve/ubb.x?a=...56&m=804102917

Other than those older remotes, none of the JP1 hardware experts think any of the recent and currently available JP1 remotes are PC controllable (although they are PC programmable). Most of the newer remotes use the Samsung S3C80 family.

Nonetheless, the JP1 remotes are very useful, IMO, to control IR controlled CE gear and can take a lot of hard to do functions in HS/HA regime that are done better in a remote but can still trigger HS events.

Since you guys are far more advanced in hardware than I am, you might be interested in some of the clever tools created in the form of small programs that run in JP1 remotes and alter their behavior and allow for them to become the most programmable of any universal remote.

[peterpc]

I have a marmitek remote 8 in 1 infrared + RF 433Mhz.
I can't see a connector near the batteries.
Is this also a JP1 remote?
Or can I make a connector to it?
Or is there a JP1 remote with RF433Mhz?
Thanks,
Peter

[zoomkat]

I took a look at some of the remote control schematics and noted that in the button matrix that the setup was always 8x8 or less. This being the case, It might be fairly simple to use two 8 bit latch chips controlled via the computer to do the button presses on the remote. Anybody know where to find schematics of the cheap RCA remote controls or the chips they use?

[hanarmco]

Peter, I don't believe that the marmitek is a JP1 remote or made by UEI. There are two US remotes, the URC-8910 and the RS-15-2117 that have RF capability. Rob Crowe the leader of the JP1 group sells a limited number of remotes and will ship anywhere in the world:
http://www.hifi-remote.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=413

I don't know the frequency but I believe that the North American frequencies are different than Europe. Since the US versions even after shipping cost much less than the European versions, we have many European users of US remotes. This works OK, since the devices are upgradeable and we can add the European IR commands that aren't in the US library.

zoomkat, the RCU810 is the only JP1 remote made by UEI that supports JP1 sold by RCA. There is a JP1 capable remote that can be bought for ~$12 if you want to add the EEPROM (that process is well documented). It's the URC-6011 (URC-6012 in WalMart) that can also support a much larger EEPROM than the typical 2KB.

If you were thinking about modifying a remote to be computer controlled, I would stick with a JP1 capable remote because of the ability to upgrade them. There is a large library of device upgrades and there are tools that allow you to add both new devices as well as new IR protocols. There are software tools that decode the huge collection of Pronto files into a usable form for JP1. We have added support for many IR keyboards, fans, air conditioners, etc. that have unusual IR protocols compared to typical CE gear. There is also a large collection of discrete commands for power and AV inputs.

[zoomkat]

I looked at some info I took while working on the below project. This 4 device remote has a 5x7 button matrix from 12 pins on the chip. When I get time I may look into making an interface to do all the button pushes via the computer parallel or serial port. The USB-UIRT Ir gizmo is an interesting alternative, but it is apparently only supported/controlled via the girder application.

http://www.geocities.com/zoomkat/irmods.htm