USB-UIRT/HD-PVR/WHS set up help...

[jbmia]

Hi Guys,

After much searching, I've been unable to locate a recent set of instructions to get the USB-UIRT working with Sagetv & the HD-PVR. The HD-PVR's IRBlaster has been a bit buggy and I've had the USB-UIRT for a while now and figured I'd give it a go.

I've also checked the manual, but it appears the "commands" menus focuses more on teaching remote codes to the USB-UIRT so it can be used as a remote proxy to control SageTV itself. Since I"m using Windows Home Server, all my remote controlling will be done from my client pc's, so I don't think this setup applies.. Am I wrong here?

What I do need to do is control my STB in conjuction with the HD-PVR. When I select that video source and attempt to change the "Tuner control" and then change the "tuning device", I get no choices... Am I just heading down the wrong path here?

There are some very old instructions circa' '93 that speak of lnrhelp, girder and other stuff, but instructions all seem to speak to a time when usb-uirt support was still in it's infancy...

Boy, with everybody using usb-uirt's, I thought it would be easy to find a set of instructions that detail how the to set it up to perform channel changing of the STB, but alas it's proving a bit harder than I thought... Do I still need girder? Can I learn the ircodes for my STB from within sagetv or do I need a 3rd party piece of software? Do I need to copy ir files somewhere? How does Sagetv know to use the USB-UIRT instead of the HD-PVR IR Blaster??

Can anyone point me in the right direction??

JB

[Skirge01]

As I channel Opus4... did you read the manual? Page 268 covers how to set up the USB-UIRT.

It's been quite a while since I set mine up, but I remember it being very easy.

EDIT: I had to re-read your post to pick up on the manual reference you made. Sorry for that. Anyhow, if you get that part working, the rest is pretty straightforward. You do need to teach SageTV what commands your remote will be sending for every function/button. At least, that's what I needed to do with my Harmony 880.

[stanger89]

It kind of sounds like the USB UIRT drivers didn't get installed, if Sage isn't recognizing that it's available for use.

[DMT]

-Stop SageTV (WHS Console)
-Connect the USB-UIRT
-Install the drivers (use the USB-UIRT XP drivers)
-Start SageTV
-Using Placeshifter go to Setup Video Sources and select your HD PVR
-Change the Tuner Control to USB-UIRT
-When asked, use your STB remote to program the USB-UIRT. SageTV will guide you through the process of entering each digit (0-9). This creates the .ir file that SageTV uses

I remember you have to hold the STB remote VERY close (1") to the USB-UIRT window or it won't read the remote when you send the code.

Stop and re-start SageTV to pick up the new .ir file

When finished position the front of the USB-UIRT towards your STB and try a channel change in SageTV

That's it I think for 1 STB. You can control 2 more - a little more involved but still quite easy. There is a how to guide in the forums.

[Chriscic]

I did this recently. It was very easy, except for when I screwed up by getting my remotes and boxes mixed up when I was teaching the USB-UIRT (suggest you sitcky a label STB1 and STB2 and remote 1 and remote 2 to avoid).

When you set up the HD-PVR tuners Sage will give you the option of using the USB-UIRT. If not, then agree you don't have the drivers installed on WHS.

It walks you through teaching the USB-UIRT the remote codes... again easy you're just pushing numbers 0-9. In my case I didn't even have to get the remote that close to the USB-UIRT for it to work smoothly.

You might also learn from my experience in depth:
http://forums.sagetv.com/forums/showthread.php?t=43126

[Islander]

I need some help with setup/installation as well.

I have a working SageTv/Sage MC installation with a WinTV-PVR-USB2 (older model -150?). Sage was setup to use the 45 button remote and worked fine. I am using Vista 64.

I bought a Harmony One and set it up to control the 150 in essence duplicating the 45 button remote. It worked as a charm, but for my impression that the IR blaster was not working as well as it should and my wish to have more control.

I bought an USB-UIRT, which has installed properly as I can see it listed under System-Device Manager-USB; however it does not seem to be recognized by SageTv as I am not able to see it listed as an option for changing the channels under the appropriate menu. I have tried removing the UIRT including the driver and reinstalling, turning SageTv on and off, rebooting the system but the UIRT is till not being seen by SageTv.

Any ideas as to how to proceed will be appreciated.

[davephan]

Have you tried using IRhelper? The small, free, IRhelper program will allow you to test receiving and sending IR codes independent of SageTV, which may help you isolate the problem.

Dave

[Islander]

Thanks great suggestion. I will give it a try and see how it goes, although I do see the red light on the UIRT fire off each time I press the remote.

[Islander]

I gave it a try but, and this is also shown on the pics in the download site I got it from, only seems to query the COM ports unless I am missing something?

I guess at this stage i need something that can confirm receipt of the ir signal although like I said I see the ir led come on each time the remote is pressed, it is that for whatever reason SageTv does not recognize it.

Any other ideas?

[davephan]

Launch the IRHelper program. Then click "Learn an IR code". Then press a number, such as "1" on the remote, with the remote control about 2 inches from the USB-UIRT. You will then see the IRHelper program display the digital code. You can make the USB-UIRT transmit the code by clicking on "Test transmit IR code", twice for channel 11, or three times for channel 111. You can do the test with the set top box remote control, and a set top box, or even a TV remote control and a TV.

You will then be able to make sure that the USB-UIRT is able to receive and transmit IR codes independent of SageTV.

The attached image is the IRHelper program capturing the "0" digit.


Dave

[Fuzzy]

Originally Posted by davephan

Have you tried using IRhelper? The small, free, IRhelper program will allow you to test receiving and sending IR codes independent of SageTV, which may help you isolate the problem.

Dave

It's LRNHELPER, not IRHelper. This may be part of the confusion (as there is a program out there called IRHelper, though it is for Serial based devices).

[davephan]

Fuzzy,

You're right! I checked the program again, and it is called LrnHelper.

Using LrnHelper should isolate the problem with the USB-UIRT for JBMia. The IR file can also be constructed with LrnHelper outside of SageTV by copying and pasting each digit can command into the file.

Dave

[jbmia]

I'm the original poster.. thought I'd come back and throw my 2 cents in since I got the USBUIRT working today.. I originally gave up and kept on using the Irblaster, but recently got fed up with the instability of the HD-PVR and opted for a reinstall of the WHS server operating system. This of course necessitated a scratch install of SageTV, the HD-PVR drivers, and the USBUIRT drivers..

DMT's post on 8/23 explains it best... my original problem was that I never got the option to choose the USBUIRT when setting up the HD-PVR as a video source. I suspect this is because I had the IRBlaster plugged into the HD-PVR while I was trying to install the USBUIRT, but I'm not sure. It might have been a driver conflict issue as well, but I strongly suspect the former.. So, if you're not getting prompted, double check that the USBUIRT is installed properly by downloading and trying Lrnhelper.exe. If the USBUIRT works with Lrnhelper.exe and you don't have the Hauppauge Irblaster plugged into the HD-PVR, you should be good to go... As you're setting up your HD-PVR as a video source, you should be prompted for if you want to use the USBUIRT...

From there, Sagetv will take you through the remote code learning process (if necessary).. which was really easy.. that was another point I was confused with.. I was wondering how and where the ir learning would take place.. It was really easy once the USBUIRT was recognized by SageTV.

So... fingers crossed.. hoping the the HD-PVR will be more stable now.. The wife has been unbelievably understanding, but it's been a real pain. Seems like every time I'd be out of the house the damn thing would stop working... Fingers crossed..

Thanks to all for their replies..

[davephan]

My HD-PVR is also more stable using the USB-UIRT instead of the built in IRblaster in the HD-PVR. The USB-UIRT also has 3 zones, so you can control 3 set top boxes. The USB-UIRT will control many more than 3 set top boxes if they are Dish Network boxes.

Dave

[Islander]

Ok thanks I will try LrnHelper on Monday.

Jbmia, my issue is that I did not have the usb-uirt when i originally setup SageTv. Maybe there is no way for SageTV to recognize USB-UIRT post initial setp of the video source as I am trying to do and it either requires for the current video source to be scratched and configured from the start or for a full re-install of SageTv. I am resisting doing either because with my luck I am affraid that the system will break somehow but I guess a full backup before any changes will take care of that.

Then there is the matter of the remote as the Harmony One has been setup to emulate the Hap 45 button one, but I guess I can always teach Sagetv what each button is meant to do.

In any event, the notice of 3 days left on the 21 days trial was coming up so I went ahead and paid for SageTv....will see how it goes.

[sic0048]

Don't worry about doing a uninstall and reinstall of the SageTV software. I've done it plenty of times without any ill effects. The uninstall process does not remove the SageTV program folder. As long as you do not delete that folder yourself, Sage reinstalls the system using the same wiz.bin and other critical files from your last installation. This way you do not loose any settings, history, favorities, etc, etc, etc.

However, I have found that uninstalling and reinstalling SageTV does help in situations like this where you have added hardware to the system after installing SageTV and you are trying to get SageTV to work correctly with that new hardware.

So I would recommend that you try the uninstall and reinstall process. It shouldn't take more than 5 minutes total IMHO.

[Islander]

This is where I got to.

I installed LrnHelper and as I expected, the UIRT is receiving the remote's signal. If only I could get LrnHelper and SageTv to co-exist then I could be 105% sure but as I cannot, I am only 99.99% sure that the UIRT is also sending the code to change the DishNetwork box. By the way, how do I get LrnHelper to learn more than one code (say 122) it seems that the previously learned code is replaced by the new one.

On to SageTV. I think the trick to getting SageTV to recognize the UIRT is to add the same source that you have again and this time selecting anothe way to tune it being the UIRT. At least that is what I did, and learned the codes from the DN remote but SageTV appears not to be sending the right codes because the led on the outgoing cable shows activity as well as SageTv but the box does not change. Simply, it is like whatever is being sent by SageTv is a code that the box does not recognize?

I tried setting the SageTV to be controlled by UIRT and "any" remote and then tested teaching it a few commands. I taught it the four movement keys (up, down, etc) but I noticed couple of things:

1. The control through the UIRT seems less responsive than the IR Blaster on the PVR; should not this be the other way around?
2. When I press, say for example, up on the Harmony One it jumps two items instead of one. If I use the actual Hap 45 button one it only jumps one item. I am not sure why this is happening because the Harmony is set to replicate the Hap exactly and if I use the Harmony to control Sage selecting the Hap 45 as the remote then I do not see this behavior? I guess if this has no solution then I could always use the Hap 45 emulation (rather than UIRT + any) to control SageTV and UIRT to control the box (assuming that I am able to determine what is going on with the above problem).

Thanks.

[timg11]

I'm working on the same process. I have recently added a USB-UIRT. (I was using a serial IRman and the Hauppauge IR blaster to tune the cable box).

The USB-UIRT works fine for receiving IR commands. LRNhelper works fine and shows received codes.

Now I'm trying to get the transmitter function to work. When I first went to the Setup Sources page and selected the HD-PVR Tuner Control, there were no options listed for changing the blaster. It says Hauppauge IR Blaster, but when I click on that, the only option is "Cancel".

Using Islander's advice, I tried using "Add New Source" and adding the HD-PVR again. I went through the process, including learning the 0-9 keys from the TW remote. At the end of the process it tried to tune a channel. It changed to channel 1 during that process, but since then, it does not change at all, from live TV or from the channel mapping setup Preview function.

In LRNhelper, the "Transmit" function on the menu is grayed out.

What am I missing? Is there some extra step needed to enable the IR transmitter of the USB-UIRT?

[Fuzzy]

may take some further tweaking.. you can up the inter-digit delay. there is also a 'repeatcount' in the .ir file that can be increased (basically, it's how many times it transmits the repeated ir code). Some STB's are more finicky than others, and you might have to tweak one or both of those settings.

[timg11]

I'll be looking into the tweaking after I get some basic functionality.

I discovered that the transmit function only is available when there is an IR code in the window of LRNhelper - either learned or pasted in.

I made a "test emitter" with a red LED wired to a 3.5mm plug. When I capture a code and test transmit, the red LED does blink as expected.

I'm using the Hauppauge emitter with an adapter cable. I'll next compare the current going to the Hauppauge emitter with the basic LED.