Remote Controls lacking?

[sakker]

Just curious what the best setups seem to be for everyone without a pc in the room. My system is 3/4 done, but looking into remote control options so far seems to be painful.

My stb is in the basement, my pc right now in in an office, eventually will be moved near the stb when it's all stable, and the tv that I am going to be controlling initially, is in the living room. Eventually I will add another extender to another one.

I have gotten so used to the rf remote that I dread moving back to an IR one, but even looking at that my options look slim. Am I really looking at having to mount an IR receiver near my tv, then extending a usb cable from there to my stb or pc, either one.

There have got to be better options for locations other than right next to each other right?

[paulbeers]

Originally Posted by sakker

Just curious what the best setups seem to be for everyone without a pc in the room. My system is 3/4 done, but looking into remote control options so far seems to be painful.

My stb is in the basement, my pc right now in in an office, eventually will be moved near the stb when it's all stable, and the tv that I am going to be controlling initially, is in the living room. Eventually I will add another extender to another one.

I have gotten so used to the rf remote that I dread moving back to an IR one, but even looking at that my options look slim. Am I really looking at having to mount an IR receiver near my tv, then extending a usb cable from there to my stb or pc, either one.

There have got to be better options for locations other than right next to each other right?

I used an ATI Remote Wonder as my first real HTPC remote. It worked fairly well (button layout wasn't great and seemed to have a slower response time). It is an RF remote. We had the HTPC sitting in the living room hooked to the living room tv and then another cord running to the bedroom in my apartment (the wall the tv was next to and the tv in the bedroom shared a wall). While I could only watch one thing on either tv., at least when I was ready for bed, I could watch anything recording in sage in the bedroom since the remote was RF. I think the ATI Remote Wonder 2 has a better layout, but I never owned it. I switched to a Dvico Fusion Remote when I went to a Client/Server setup (which is IR, and have used only IR remotes since).

[Jesse]

Hi,

Which RF remote are you using now? Can you purchase a second RF receiver/base station for it that could be located near the pc?

I use Home Theater Master MX-800's. This is an IR/RF remote that is pc programmable and can communicate with multiple base stations. You can see it here: http://www.surfremotecontrol.com/Mer...ct_Code=MX-800 If you go this route make sure you buy from an authorized dealer, otherwise you will get no software or warranty.

Another option would be an IR extender from someone like Xantech. I have used these. They are simple, reliable and unobtrusive. The IR receiver can wired to the connecting block with cat5. See one here: http://www.audio-direct.com/item.asp...a9&origin=desc

HTH

Jesse

[sakker]

Right now the RF remote I use is a Dish Network pvr remote. I haven't converted to Sage, I'm in the process of setting everything up and getting it stable before I break it out upon the wife and kids. Part of that means I am going to have to come up with something that 1 works as well or better than what I currently have for a remote, I know Sage will work better. Secondly that means it can't look bad and have wires or boxes all over to accomplish it.

I guess I am still just unclear as to exactly what I am going to need to pull this off and what the options are.

I know I'll need a remote that will move around the cursor in Sage for menu selection, etc. Also it will need to be able to change channels on the satellite stb I assume with an ir blaster type attachment.

[kltye]

Out of curiosity, how many people would like to use some sort of PocketPC to control their HTPC? Presumably the PocketPC interface will allow keyboard entry, (rudimentary) mouse control and have preset touch screen buttons for Play/Pause, Menu, Volume Up/Down, Guide, etc.? The pocket PC will interface with the HTPC via Bluetooth or WiFi.

[GKusnick]

The part I'm not clear on is how you're going to get the SageTV output onto your TV. If you don't want a PC in the TV room, then you're going to need an extender, which comes with its own remote and IR receiver.

Or are you talking about putting the PC next to the TV? In that case, yes, you will need a USB or serial IR receiver of some sort. I use a USB-UIRT, which is small and inconspicuous and works with pretty much any IR remote. So pick a remote you like (or already have) and spend half an hour teaching Sage the codes, and you should be set.

[sakker]

Originally Posted by GKusnick

The part I'm not clear on is how you're going to get the SageTV output onto your TV. If you don't want a PC in the TV room, then you're going to need an extender, which comes with its own remote and IR receiver.

Or are you talking about putting the PC next to the TV? In that case, yes, you will need a USB or serial IR receiver of some sort. I use a USB-UIRT, which is small and inconspicuous and works with pretty much any IR remote. So pick a remote you like (or already have) and spend half an hour teaching Sage the codes, and you should be set.

Ok, I guess i've left that part out.

As of now I am trying to hold off for the HD extender to come out and use that. If it ends up not being out, or no new information about when it will be out by mid April, I will probably just do the current one and move that to a second tv when the hd comes out.

So essentially I am going to have tv in one room with an extender, pc in another room, and stb's in another room. I am having trouble seeing how I am going to control Sage and allow Sage to control my stb's.

I didn't know the extender came with it's own remote, I guess that makes sense now that I think about it. So the hd/sd extender whichever I end up with controls sage after I add a cable extension on and fish it though the walls. Then how would an extender work with my stb's, or sage with my stb's.

Sorry if I sound dumb, but I feel like it at the moment.

[sakker]

Originally Posted by kltye

Out of curiosity, how many people would like to use some sort of PocketPC to control their HTPC? Presumably the PocketPC interface will allow keyboard entry, (rudimentary) mouse control and have preset touch screen buttons for Play/Pause, Menu, Volume Up/Down, Guide, etc.? The pocket PC will interface with the HTPC via Bluetooth or WiFi.

Sounds interesting.

[GKusnick]

Originally Posted by sakker

Then how would an extender work with my stb's, or sage with my stb's.

The extender doesn't need to control your STBs. It's just a playback device, receiving streamed content from the Sage server. The server in turn controls the STBs as needed for recording or live TV viewing on the clients.

The way it does that depends on the STB. Some STBs have serial inputs for that purpose, and that's the preferred way to do it. You'll probably need some additional software configuration to get that working, but I'm not an expert on that. If your STB lacks a serial connector, you'll need an IR blaster to control it. There are various options for this, but again, the USB-UIRT is a popular solution that can control up to three STBs. If your STB has neither a serial input nor an IR input (i.e. it has only an RF remote), then you might be out of luck. I don't think anyone has found a good solution for that.

All of these STB control issues are discussed extensively in various threads in this Hardware forum. Try searching for "serial control" or "IR blaster" and see what you come up with.

[Flips]

Originally Posted by kltye

Out of curiosity, how many people would like to use some sort of PocketPC to control their HTPC? Presumably the PocketPC interface will allow keyboard entry, (rudimentary) mouse control and have preset touch screen buttons for Play/Pause, Menu, Volume Up/Down, Guide, etc.? The pocket PC will interface with the HTPC via Bluetooth or WiFi.

ME!

I use it now with xlobby, and it's great, but it would be awesome to not have to use xlobby and just run Sage. xlobby uses wifi, which works great with my xv6700. I can turn the receiver, control volume and start playing music from any room in the house.

flips