Hardwired IR Distribution

[SteveD]

I am very close to making the move to hard wired IR. After searching and searching this and other message boards I think the setup will be SECU-16IR, Guy's isolater/amplifier and Xantech connecting blocks. I have two questions that I have not been able to find the answer to however:

If I have a four emitter connecting block can one of these be an IR blaster?

How or where do I feed in the signal from a remote IR receiver?

isolater/amplifier is here

http://www.appdigsupport.com/cgi-bin...=000019#000012

Rupp, before you you say anything about powermids, my house hates RF. I have one set of powermids that work about half the time and have problems with ant RF device.

SteveD

[Rupp]

SteveD,
I wasn't going to suggest Powermids since your looking for a hardwire solution. I only offer this suggestion to those who haven't tried them and hopefully save them some time and work. If the powermids are pointed at sunlight they can have serious problems as well if they are near any other cordless devices.

Good luck.

[SteveD]

Rupp

I didn't mean to offend, Powermids would be a much cheaper and easier solution. I wish I could make them work.

SteveD

[CCIE]

Steve, I use Xantech 789-44 connector blocks in my house. By 'blaster' do you mean using one of the emitter ports to feed a blaster, such as a powermid? If this is your question, the answer is yes. For some time I used one end of a powermid duo to blast signals into an AV room; it was fed from one of the xantech 789-44's. Over time, I got tired of the powermid reliability problems, and converted to mouse emitters.

As for your second question, my connector blocks have a molex-type plug that is used for IR in. I feed the IR from an RF remote base station.

I hope this helps...

Ryan

[SteveD]

Ryan

Yes, this helps, I think I have the second input figured out now. As for a blaster, I don't think I can get the emitter to powermid to work. I need something that would be driven off of the SECU-16IR or the connecting block. I see that Smathome has one bbut am not sure about compatability.

SteveD

[CCIE]

Do you just need a way to get IR into the system?

Ryan

[SteveD]

I'll be more specific. My entertainment center with eight components sits on one side of the room, a connecting block with stick on emitters will take care of this. On the other side of the room are the mimiblind controllers, I will need to blast from the media center to control these. Is there a blaster that I can plug into the connecting block to do this?

SteveD

[CCIE]

Is there a blaster that I can plug into the connecting block to do this?

Yes. The powermid can do this one of 2 ways (there are other makers out there as well). The powermid blaster has an IR input, from what I remember. You could wire the connector block directly to the blaster. The other way (which is a bit more guetto) would be to hook an emitter directly to the powermid IR reciever, and then set the powermid blaster directly next to the receiver (so RF doesn't have to travel).

I have seen other products that will take an IR feed (via hardwire) and blast it for you that are better quality than powermids...

Personally, I decided to go with an RF to IR solution using no blasters, but that doesn't sound like a workable solution for you. Have you tracked down the problem with RF in your house?

Ryan