[mythtv-users] Re: Transmission timing with ir blaster to cable box

[scut erky]

Thanks Steve, though I'm not sure if that's a good sign or bad that we're sharing the same issue. 
 
The only other thing I can note is that I have been able to get the cable box to respond to send_once commands with repeated numbers. i.e.
    %rc send_once gi-motorola-dct2000 2 2 2 2 2 2 2
For some reason, it takes seven of these for it to register. And I'd be fine with hacking the channel.pl script for this, but the results aren't reliable enough.
 
Finally, nor does my cable box have a serial port.
 
I'm wondering if there is a parameter in lircd.conf that can be manipulated to maybe send more of a pulse than a flash. 

Steven Bennett <sablists at earthlink.net> wrote:
I'll second this report -- I'm using lirc 0.7.0 pre2 snapshot, with a
DCT2224 cable box and the same Actisys 200L IR Blaster, and have the exact
same issue.

What's really interesting (and somewhat confusing) is that if you do the
send_once and give it a bunch of the same numbers, or do a bunch of
send_once commands for the same numbers in a script, it still doesn't
manager to get picked up by the receiver at all. But the
send_start/send_end does just fine. Looking at the blaster, it's clear that
any sequence of send_once inserts a noticeable delay in-between each
transmission, but the send_start transmits the signal continuously. (Oh
yes, and it appears lirc transmissions adversely affect the system clock --
I've had it lose minutes during heavy testing...)

Unfortunately, while I've been experimenting with a new channel.pl script
to do a start-delay-stop-delay for each number, I've not been able to get it
to produce accurate results yet, although I'm close with a quarter second
delay in-between the start/stop. (You have to use the system sleep command
instead of the perl one to get it to do fractions of a second...)

Still, sometimes it misses a number, and sometimes it gets it twice, and
more importantly what the cable box happens to be doing at the moment.

I can't really blame this on the blaster, though -- I see similar behavior
(dropped presses, occasional doubles) just using the standard remote. But
there the user has visual feedback and it's just a mild annoyance. With the
blaster, a mistake on this means you record the wrong channel.

And unlike the earlier threads in the archives discussing this cable box and
it's variants, mine does NOT have a serial port I can use to control the box
instead.

I haven't had the time to fool with this recently, but will be looking at it
again soon. Anyone out there have any suggestions?

Thanks,
-->Steve Bennett


scut erky wrote:

> I've been configuring lirc (0.6.6) and ir blaster (actisys 200L) to work with
> a gi-motorola dct2000 cable box. I'm running mandrake 9.1 and myth 0.11 from
> rpms.
> 
> The lirc daemon starts fine, the lircd.conf is unchanged from the
> remotes/motorola/DCT2000 file and the irw and mode2 commands demonstrate that
> the ir blaster responds properly to signals from the cable box remote.
> 
> This trouble isn't with mythtv per se, but with the trasmission from the ir
> blaster to the cable box. I've searched all the posts and have seen hints of
> this trouble but no solution.
> 
> If I run 
> %rc send_once gi-motorola-dct2000 CHUP
> I see lights from the ir blaster but no indication of response from the cable
> box (a little light lights up when it receives an IR signal)
> 
> It's only when I send a repeating signal like
> %rc send_start gi-motorola-dct2000 CHUP
> 
> wait a few seconds, then
> %rc send_stop gi-motorola-dct2000 CHUP
> 
> that I can get the cable box to respond to signals from the ir blaster. The
> distance between the ir blaster and cable box does not seem to affect
> anything.
> 
> So basically, this looks like the ir blaster is transmitting too fast for the
> cable box. And my question is, is there any way to slow down the transmission
> from the ir blaster?
> 
> Thanks for any assistance.


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