[mythtv-users] IR Transmitter

[Khanh Tran]

Since you have the SA 4200 (same cable box I have), have you ever tried
interfacing your MythTV box  with the USB keyboard port?  I don't even
know where to start with this one, but Google yields little help on
sending keyboard commands via serial, USB, or parallel ports...
 
-Khanh


________________________________

From: Steven Rubano [mailto:srubano at ccap.net] 
Sent: Tuesday, April 06, 2004 4:21 PM
To: mythtv-users at mythtv.org
Subject: Re: [mythtv-users] IR Transmitter



> I also had absolutely no knowledge of electronics and I also have 

the SA

> 2100.  I did exactly what Dan describes above and was able to make it 

> work pretty painlessly.

 

>Thanks for the endorsement!

 

> 

> Another way to test it is to temporarily replace the IR LED with a 

> regular LED.  I took one from an old ethernet card.  If everything is 

> put together correctly, it will light up when you execute the "irsend"


> command shown above.  Also, if you want to try it first without 

> soldering, you can use a small piece of "breadboard".  You should be 

> able to find that at Radio Shack (or any other similar 

 

>To clarify what Brian said, get a piece of soldierless breadboard; not 

>the regular breadboard.  Should run < $10.  For the wires for it, you 

>could buy the wiring kit, or hack up some old cat 5 cable.  The 

>non-stranded wire will work perfect.

> 

>-dan

 

CAT 5 cable is stranded (read soft), it won't push into the solderless
bread board. What works very well is some old solid phone cable (the
cable that's ran in your walls, not the soft kind that is going from
jack to phone). 

 

I built the Simple IR transmitter (Diode, resistor, IR attached to a
cable with DB9 connector) and it works awesome with my Scientific
Atlantic 4200 explorer box. What I used for an IR LED is actually cool,
I took an "IR Blaster" from a Direct TV box (basically all it is; is an
IR LED molded in a plastic housing with a wire attached to it and a din
plug at the other end). Reason why I used this was because the IR LED
was housed in an "L" shaped molded plastic housing. You applied double
back tape to one side of it and stick it on the shelf above the box that
is being controlled. Since it is in an L shape, the LED is angled in a
way that it's pointing directly at the box (I hope you guys get the
idea) and it blends in (hidden if your entertainment unit is black). I
then cut the DIN plug off and soldered the components to it and placed
the components in a small project box (the box is actually the same size
as a car alarm remote) and attached the DB9 connector to it. It looks
like the IR blaster was made for MythTV! I don't know where you can buy
these IR Blaster LED's from, I took it from a friend of mine who has DTV
and did not need it. 

 

One thing though for the person who is building this setup with his
PVR350, I had to run another instance of LIRC separate from the instance
that was currently running to get my PVR350 remote/receiver working. I
have a write up somewhere on how to do this if they are interested. I
found it on the web but modified it for the serial driver (the one on
the web described how to get a second instance running for the SIR
driver in LIRC)

 

Steve




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