Can usb-uirt receive and send signals

[dc9mm]

I have a USB-uirt and have been using it to cotrol my STB and that works fine. For a remote control i was using a black Hauppauge remote and the IR receiver that came with that remote. BUT i have recently bought the newer 45 button gray colored Hauppauge remote and it doesnt work with the hauppauge IR receiver and confirmed that with tech support from Hauppauge.

So i want to be able if possable to use the USB_UIRT for both controlling my STB and ALSO receiving remote control signals from my new 45 button hauppauge remote to control Sagetv. Only problem is i have no clue on how to setup the USB_UIRT to receive signals from remote. I see in Sagetv under setup/commands were i can pick usb-uirt send and receive with any remote choice but i dont see were i can pick to teach the USB-Uirt for receiving.

So do setup the USB-UIRT for receiving signals from my remote in SageTv somewere were i can teach it commands from new remote? or do i do this outside of sagetv and if so with what?. I saw that program Girder over were they sell the USB-UIRT do i need that? I dont want to have to buy that if i dont need too.

[Fuzzy]

the answer is... maybe. the usb-uirt is perfectly capable of both sending and receiving IR signals, and both functions are supported in sage. there are some restrictions though. If you are using Win7, and running in service mode, it is not possible. this is because only one 'session' can access the USB-UIRT at the same time. In Win7, the service and the UI Client are run in different sessions, even if the service is logged in as the same user. This was the case with vista as well, but there was an option in vista to 'allow service to interact with desktop', which forced it to work in the desktop session... this feature has been removed in win7 for security reasons.

So, you have options... either use sage outside of service mode, in which case you will ahve no problems using the usb-uirt for both.. or use winxp, which always runs the service in the desktop session...

[dc9mm]

I should have put more info, sorry about that.
Running Win XP pro 32 bit on a P4 3.0 1 gig ram 2 hard drives, gefoce vid car 256 ram.

Whats is service mode??

I looked in the manual and it looks like i should use the link keystroke/infrared to sage tv command. BUT i cant get it to work. I start with a command like prevous channel. I click on it with my mouse and box pops up saying press the remote control button or keystrok to link to sage tv command i press the remote i have aimed right at the USB-UIRT i see the USB-UIRT flash so its getting the signal but sage doesnt seem to get the IR command. What iam i doing wrong??

[wayner]

I believe you will want to make sure that the SageTVService, if you are using this mode, is using the same User as the SageTV app. You can easily change the User running a service by going into the Control Panel.

[dc9mm]

Ok i got it working were its allowing me to link commands to the remote BUT it takes me to pushes on the remote to get it to do the command. In other words i need to hit as an example prevous channel twice on the remote before it goes to the prevous channel. This applies to all copmmands on the remote. I must hit the button on the remote twice before it does what i want it to. I remember reading something about Hauppauge remotes that they double the command or something like that. I cant remember. How do i get around this? Iam using the Grey colored Hauppauge 45 button remote.

[Fuzzy]

It sounds like your remote uses alternating codes. Every button has two distinct transmissions associated with it. each press of the button sends alternating signals. this was created to be able to more easily recognize the difference between a bunch of successive button presses, and one long button hold (the long hold would simply constantly repeat a single transmission, while a bunch of individual button presses would result in alternating codes with each button press).

Sage is not specifically aware of this situation, but you can make it work by learning each of the two codes to each command. For instance, learn your prev-chan button in sage.. then choose to learn prev-chan again, and press and hold the button again. You should end up with two separate IR codes listed in sage for that command. You'll have to repeat this for each command you need to program.

[dc9mm]

Thanks much, that worked. This forum is great.

Originally Posted by Fuzzy

It sounds like your remote uses alternating codes. Every button has two distinct transmissions associated with it. each press of the button sends alternating signals. this was created to be able to more easily recognize the difference between a bunch of successive button presses, and one long button hold (the long hold would simply constantly repeat a single transmission, while a bunch of individual button presses would result in alternating codes with each button press).

Sage is not specifically aware of this situation, but you can make it work by learning each of the two codes to each command. For instance, learn your prev-chan button in sage.. then choose to learn prev-chan again, and press and hold the button again. You should end up with two separate IR codes listed in sage for that command. You'll have to repeat this for each command you need to program.

[KryptoNyte]

Folks,

I'm missing something here. I have a remote that doesn't just rotate a pair of codes, but rotates through a long list of codes per button. I've captured (2) codes per button using IR Learn, and tested these two codes in IR Learn and they always tune consecutively, as I was hopping. Of course, I can never use the same code twice in a row, so thought I had this licked when it worked manually in IR Learn.

Unfortunately in Sage, it's not executing the alternating codes as I thought it would. The USB-UIRT IR file that I manually created is attached (file extension changed from ir to txt for forum) - clearly there's something wrong with my syntax, and I'm stuck.

[KryptoNyte]

I should probably mention that I'm actually trying to get the USB-UIRT to channel change the Linksys DMA2100. I'm not trying to program a remote control to work with Sage.

[Fuzzy]

For blasting channel changes, the 2-mode IR codes are not all that important. Yes, normally it will only accept one button press per code alteration, but there's a timeout in there. So if it gets code A, 5 times in a row immediately, then it will treat it as one button push. However, if it gets code A, then a second or so later, gets code A again, it WILL treat it as a second button push. You may have to increase the delay in-between digits if you are using an alternating code device, so it 'forgets' the previous alternation that it was waiting for. In short, Sage should only ever need to learn one of the alternating code for the purpose of blasting.

Now, when learning for blasting, you also have to remember to hold your remote only about an inch or so from the USB-UIRT. It needs an incredibly strong and clean signal to learn and properly decode it to the right string.

[KryptoNyte]

Yeah, I found pretty quick that you have to hold the remote fairly close. I played with that for a couple hours, and then again in a dark basement. Then again with another remote that I had already done this with successfully to be sure I wasn't screwing this up.

In Sage, testing an infrared code that I had programmed successfully earlier - I send the "1" code, the DMA2100 responds that it received a "1."

I've waiting anywhere from 1 second to 2 minutes between emitting the same code for the same keypress (in that same Sage IR code testing area), but never get any response from the second attempt of sending the "1" code.

[EnterNoEscape]

Originally Posted by KryptoNyte

Yeah, I found pretty quick that you have to hold the remote fairly close. I played with that for a couple hours, and then again in a dark basement. Then again with another remote that I had already done this with successfully to be sure I wasn't screwing this up.

In Sage, testing an infrared code that I had programmed successfully earlier - I send the "1" code, the DMA2100 responds that it received a "1."

I've waiting anywhere from 1 second to 2 minutes between emitting the same code for the same keypress (in that same Sage IR code testing area), but never get any response from the second attempt of sending the "1" code.

That's because as you suspected, RC6 36-bit (which is what the WMC IR codes are encoded as) requires some additional bits between transmissions of the same button. Not all devices reset after some time of not receiving the alternate code. On some of them you would need to hit another button first to be able to repeat the same button without using the alternate code. I think you can get it to fire off both codes if you get both of them and place them on the same line, but that might also just send two button presses. I believe Telecore did this to send two buttons to a FiOS STB, so it will send Menu, then Exit. The STB's are very simple since they mostly use NEC codes.

As an alternative, it would be nice to be able to tell SageTV that it needs to alternate codes. RC5 and RC6 have always been a pain when they are learned by a program that doesn't understand that it needs to flip a bit/add bits between transmissions. I'm not actually sure I've seen a program that handles the USB-UIRT differently when these kinds of code are learned.