[mythtv-users] IR Transmitter

[Clint Gilders]

Dan Morphis wrote:
> To build the simple circuit, you'll need a few parts:
> 
> 1 x 1N4148 diode
> 1 x 3k ohm
> 1 x IR LED (Can be scavanged from an old remote, or you can use LD 271)
> 1 x Soldier style db9 male
> 
> Soldier a wire on to pin 4 of the db9 header.  Take the other end and 
> soldier it to the anode (The end W/O the black line) on the diode.  Take 
> the other end of the diode and soldier it to one end of the resister.  
> Take the other end of the resister and soldier it to anode of the ir led 
> (The side w/o the flat spot [someone please correct me if I have that 
> backwards]).  Take the other end of the ir led and soldier it to pin 5 
> of the db9 male connector.
> 
> You should be looking at less than $5 in parts.  If you want a quick way 
> to test the circuit, fire up the camcorder and look through the view 
> finder while lirc is sending a signal.  A quick way to send the signal 
> is: irsend SEND_START <REMOTE_NAME> 1
> 
> Hope this helps.  Feel free to ask any questions you might have!

Thank-you so much for the easy to follow instructions.

I yanked the IR LED and a coloured led out of a broken remote my kids 
play with.  My wife brought me the wire, diode and resistor from work. I 
removed the casing from a ps2 to serial mouse adapter to get the db9 
plug.

I then soldered it all up (I included the coloured LED so I could see if 
a signal was being sent).   I use star choice in Canada, and I was able 
to find an lircd.conf file for it's remote ( at 
http://lirc.sourceforge.net/remotes/motorola/IRC-442 ).  I also 
installed change_channel_lirc.sh from the contrib section of the myth 
source.  I re-compiled lirc to work with the new transmitter, and 
rebooted.   Whiz! Bang! It Works!  `irsend StarChoice405 300` tunes in 
the CBC.

Oh yeah, I also had to add:

`/bin/setserial /dev/ttyS0 uart none` to the beginning of my lircd init 
script.

Thanks again.
-- 
Clint Gilders <techservices at onlinehobbyist.com>
Director of Technology Services
OnlineHobbyist.com, Inc.