IR on thin client

[bmblank]

I have a question about IR now... My brother and I are using a series of axims as remotes for xlobby. They all have IR. We now have a USBIRT that we're figuring out, but I was wondering if it were possible to have the IR directed out of the axims IR port. There are some wallmounted plates with IR recievers for the whole house stereo and we don't want to run wires from the computer all the way out to the wallmounted plates to put a IR blaster. Then we can adjust speaker volumes just by pointing and clicking..

So I'd make a couple buttons (volume up, volume down, power, input, etc) on the ppcscreen and have those buttons direct IR signals out of the axims ir port. I sure hope this is possible..

thanks
ben

[bmblank]

I'd hate to, but I'm gonna have to bump this and hope somebody has an answer. It'll be my last shameless bump of this subject, don't worry.

[hvs69]

I think there exists a better way to achive what you are trying to do.

If you want to control internal applications on your PC such as a DVD player like zoomplayer, you can use the 'sendmessage' event to communicate directly with the application using the thin client on your Axim. You can easily find the events for popular DVD players like zoom or theatertek. It works very well on my system. There is virtually no lag and no remote pointing involved.

If you want to control external devices like your receiver, the USB-UIRT plugin will do the job. USB-UIRT units have a powerful IR blaster that will be very reliable. Axim IR device is wimpy and is not very reliable.

[bmblank]

I realize that xlobby will control computer applications. I also realize that the usbirt would control the dvd player and such. But what we have is a series of ir recievers mounted on the walls. One for each "zone". These recievers don't go to a computer, but they go to our audio distribution. There would be no way to control those IR panels as they are places such as out on the porch, where there are no computers around. Instead of running an ir blaster from the xlobby machine out to the porch, into my room, into my brothers room, into the living room, into the kitchen, into the dining room, into the computer room, onto the back porch, into the garage... sorry... I'd like to have the axims capable of sending the IR signal wherever we are. I hope this kinda clears up my initial question.

By the way, thanks for the quick reply

[P3rv3rt B3ar]

Abondon the infrastructure get radioactive man!

[bmblank]

That "Infrastructure" is prettymuch brand new. And it does away with all this trying to link zones and junk. It's very nice. I'll have to get a product/site from my brother to direct you to. Heck, maybe it's even possible to input commands into it and then forego the IR. It'd be nice. Highly unlikely, but nice...

[techspaces]

What type of audio system is it? Abus, Russound, etc?

If the volume control commands for each zone are different, then you could have the IR from XL go from the UIRT directly to the audio controller. In most cases, IR signals can be spliced so the controller would get signals from both locations (keypad and XL).

If the audio system determines which zone to control by which keypad the signal comes from (which is the case with ABus and some others), then you would have to use a Global Cache unit instead of a UIRT. GC units allow you to send IR signals from specific ports, which could be wired seperately to each zone. You just need to make sure you know where to splice in. On most multi-zone audio systems that use cat5 cable, one pair is for IR.

[bmblank]

I believe it is abus. It'd be nice to splice in, or maybe make some sort of jumper that splices it in. I've never heard of "global cache" and I don't think our xlobby computer is powerful enough to accomodate that.. Very interesting though, I'll try and look more into that.
Thanks

Edit
Just looked up globalcache. realized that it's a standalone type thing. So with that the computer would send a signal to it, then it would differentiate which zone it is supposed to control and sends the signal to that zone, correct? That'd be pretty nice. But I think it's out of our budget.

One of the problems is 1 remote controls every zone. The zone that reacts depends on which zone recieves the signal. So in order to control each zone seperately, there would need to be different controls for each zone, then they'd need to be converted back to their original controls.

I only glanced at globalcache, but I'm gonna look it up in more depth when I'm not at work.
Thanks again.

[techspaces]

If your comp will run girder, you can use Global Cache. Here's a link to their website

http://www.globalcache.com/

What brand is your audio system? I can probably help you figure out which pair the splice needs to be on.

[aeblank]

Guys,

I'm the brother.
Yes, it is a Russound ABUS system (AH484 hub and KPC-2 keypads).

All we're really looking to do is to have a couple buttons on the PPC skin that can (through another program, I assume) control volume and on/off via IR.

So, I'm on the porch sitting in my lazy boy (no, I'm not kidding - lounge chairs on the porch). I grab my PPC and point it at the keypad and hit 'keypad on' and hit 'volume up', then I grab a playlist and play it. Everything is normal xlobby except the 'keypad on' and 'volume up'.

globalcache sounds (just by reading this, I'll look into it more) like something that would be fun for more customization / control, but seems like way overkill for what we want (now).

I think the USBIRT is irrelevant for this particular discussion. The audio keypads do IR pass-through, so I can point a remote at the keypad and if the command isn't for that specific keypad (on, volume, source), it passes it through to the hub - where I put an emitter. That emitter will go on the USBIRT and thus eventually allow functions like pause, skip, navigation, etc. Pretty standard stuff, I think.

In short, can the PPC skin of xlobby call an external program to toss out an IR signal?

[briands]

What type of audio system is it? Abus, Russound, etc?

If the volume control commands for each zone are different, then you could have the IR from XL go from the UIRT directly to the audio controller. In most cases, IR signals can be spliced so the controller would get signals from both locations (keypad and XL).

If the audio system determines which zone to control by which keypad the signal comes from (which is the case with ABus and some others), then you would have to use a Global Cache unit instead of a UIRT. GC units allow you to send IR signals from specific ports, which could be wired seperately to each zone. You just need to make sure you know where to splice in. On most multi-zone audio systems that use cat5 cable, one pair is for IR.

I'm pretty sure the USBUIRT is zonable (three per unit) where the built in emitter is one zone, then the jack on the back is stereo and each channel is addressable as a seperate zone. I think you can also use more than one to get additional IR zones of control.

[techspaces]

I'm pretty sure the USBUIRT is zonable (three per unit) where the built in emitter is one zone, then the jack on the back is stereo and each channel is addressable as a seperate zone. I think you can also use more than one to get additional IR zones of control.

Dang, I didn't know that! That's going to make my current project much easier.

As for the PPC ir output, I don't think that's something you're going to be able to do. I'm pretty sure that's something Steven would have to add to the thin client code. It's definitely within the capabilities of the PPC, just not the XL thin client.

I had one other idea, but I don't know if it would work, or how to do it. If you can find a prog that will allow you to customize some of the buttons on the PPC, you could reassign them to send the IR signals you need out the IRda. Just make sure to unbind them in the server.txt file if you're binding all buttons.

[BaddaBing]

Here is a resource for USBUIRT info: http://www.usbuirt.com/phpBB2/index.php