PC Tuning Card & DISH 522

[RHITche]

I've been reading through almost every post regarding remote control configurations, and still have a couple questions on how I can do what I want...

I just got a new PC that has a tv tuner that works off of IR. The only problem is that the computer is running off of TV2, since the "real" TV has a premium sound system that requires it to be running off of TV1. I've dreamed up of a few ideas to make my computer change the channels on the satellite receiver, but have no idea how to actually get them functional.


Is there a way to control TV2 with the IR remote? There was a thread titled "UHF PRO Remote to Control TV1?" that states that TV1 can be controlled with the UHF by changing a few options in the Installation settings on the receiver, but for the computer to control TV2, TV2 must accept commands from the IR port. ...if that doesn't work...

Does anyone know of any equipment that will receive an IR remote signal and then convert that to the UHF required for TV2?

If anyone has tried to do this (or something similar) before, I'm up for suggestions!

Thanks.

-Mike

 

[holman]

This is what I have done, if it's not what you are wanting to do maybe it will give you some ideas.

First I bought this PC to IR sender, http://www.smarthome.com/1623.HTML .There are several others I found but this one works well for me. Plus its a learning remote which I liked.

Now whenever I turn off the TV for the night I switch the 522 to single mode with shared view enabled. This allows the 522 to be controlled by either IR or RF, and you can hit the swap key to access either tuner. (Just a side note, you have to hit the button on the front of the 522 to switch to Single mode, but if you power down tuner 2 first you don't have to hit accept on tuner 1 to go into single view.)

Then I can log into my home computer using VNC or some similar program when I'm away and change channels or set up recordings or whatever using the software that comes with the smarthome 1623 and viewing it with WebcamXP or some similar program. The nice thing about the 1623 software is that you can create files on the computer such as DishCannelUp.ir that will fire the ir code for that command when you double click on it in windows explorer.

Right now I am trying to figure out a way to execute the DishCannelUp.ir file locally on my computer through a web page type interface so I don't have to logon with VNC which can be slow. If anybody knows how to do this please let me know.

Anyway, then when I come home I put the 522 back into dual mode, and do my daily reset (which since I started doing daily has fixed most of my problems with the 522, I just have the occasional A/V sync issues when there are 2 recordings. Come on 2.06 maybe this is the one).

Sorry I got a little long winded there, but I am all keyed up watching the Cardinal Astros game. Go Cards.

Good luck, hope this helps some.

Mike (different one. He's not talking to himself.)

 

[ShadowEKU]

This is what I have done, if it's not what you are wanting to do maybe it will give you some ideas.

First I bought this PC to IR sender, http://www.smarthome.com/1623.HTML .There are several others I found but this one works well for me. Plus its a learning remote which I liked.

Now whenever I turn off the TV for the night I switch the 522 to single mode with shared view enabled. This allows the 522 to be controlled by either IR or RF, and you can hit the swap key to access either tuner. (Just a side note, you have to hit the button on the front of the 522 to switch to Single mode, but if you power down tuner 2 first you don't have to hit accept on tuner 1 to go into single view.)

Then I can log into my home computer using VNC or some similar program when I'm away and change channels or set up recordings or whatever using the software that comes with the smarthome 1623 and viewing it with WebcamXP or some similar program. The nice thing about the 1623 software is that you can create files on the computer such as DishCannelUp.ir that will fire the ir code for that command when you double click on it in windows explorer.

Right now I am trying to figure out a way to execute the DishCannelUp.ir file locally on my computer through a web page type interface so I don't have to logon with VNC which can be slow. If anybody knows how to do this please let me know.

Anyway, then when I come home I put the 522 back into dual mode, and do my daily reset (which since I started doing daily has fixed most of my problems with the 522, I just have the occasional A/V sync issues when there are 2 recordings. Come on 2.06 maybe this is the one).

Sorry I got a little long winded there, but I am all keyed up watching the Cardinal Astros game. Go Cards.

Good luck, hope this helps some.

Mike (different one. He's not talking to himself.)

Pretty impressive...

for your web scripting try installing IIS or Apache on that computer (make sure yo open port 80 on your firewall) and put that dishchannelup.ir into the apache web directory without an index or default so it just looks like a file listing. it has a 50/50 chance of working it will either try to download the .ir file or it will run it.

 

[ShadowEKU]

I've been reading through almost every post regarding remote control configurations, and still have a couple questions on how I can do what I want...

I just got a new PC that has a tv tuner that works off of IR. The only problem is that the computer is running off of TV2, since the "real" TV has a premium sound system that requires it to be running off of TV1. I've dreamed up of a few ideas to make my computer change the channels on the satellite receiver, but have no idea how to actually get them functional.


Is there a way to control TV2 with the IR remote? There was a thread titled "UHF PRO Remote to Control TV1?" that states that TV1 can be controlled with the UHF by changing a few options in the Installation settings on the receiver, but for the computer to control TV2, TV2 must accept commands from the IR port. ...if that doesn't work...

Does anyone know of any equipment that will receive an IR remote signal and then convert that to the UHF required for TV2?

If anyone has tried to do this (or something similar) before, I'm up for suggestions!

Thanks.

-Mike

and for the record the only way to use an IR remote for TV 2 is to switch it to single mode.

 

[AJF]

and for the record the only way to use an IR remote for TV 2 is to switch it to single mode.

This is really stupid ! I consider this a problem that I hope they can change . I brought this up on another thread and all I got was "well why would you need IR for TV2 when you can use the UHF remote ? ". RHITche gives a good example of why it's needed, and there are a few more instances where you would want to use IR .

holman has a great work-around but it seems like a pain and it would be totally unnecessary if they would (if they even can ? ) just enable TV2 to work with IR .

 

[TuxCoder]

for your web scripting try installing IIS or Apache on that computer (make sure yo open port 80 on your firewall) and put that dishchannelup.ir into the apache web directory without an index or default so it just looks like a file listing. it has a 50/50 chance of working it will either try to download the .ir file or it will run it.

I know Apache won't automatically just try to run a program, which is good. But I have heard IIS will do that, which is bad. And my Apache logs can prove that about IIS, since I get hit countless times each day with exe requests by worms/viruses/script kiddies thinking it's IIS instead of Linux+Apache.

Anyways, to try to get Apache to run it, you'll need to edit the Apache configuration to set up the .ir file type as a CGI script (and set the corresponding CGI directive for the relative "web" directory the file resides in). Then it may or may not run; I don't have any Windows+Apache experience. You might need to make sure your windows "registry file type associations" are set up for .ir files. In Unix/Linux, it's much easier since any new kind of script can itself tell the kernel what's needed to run it, then that script automatically becomes a valid executable file.

 

[ShadowEKU]

This is really stupid ! I consider this a problem that I hope they can change . I brought this up on another thread and all I got was "well why would you need IR for TV2 when you can use the UHF remote ? ". RHITche gives a good example of why it's needed, and there are a few more instances where you would want to use IR .

holman has a great work-around but it seems like a pain and it would be totally unnecessary if they would (if they even can ? ) just enable TV2 to work with IR .

I agree completely. But in Dish collective mind UHF control of receivers is better than IR. nevermind that UHF interfears with stuff like police radios but alas dish just doesnt think.

 

[ShadowEKU]

I know Apache won't automatically just try to run a program, which is good. But I have heard IIS will do that, which is bad. And my Apache logs can prove that about IIS, since I get hit countless times each day with exe requests by worms/viruses/script kiddies thinking it's IIS instead of Linux+Apache.

Anyways, to try to get Apache to run it, you'll need to edit the Apache configuration to set up the .ir file type as a CGI script (and set the corresponding CGI directive for the relative "web" directory the file resides in). Then it may or may not run; I don't have any Windows+Apache experience. You might need to make sure your windows "registry file type associations" are set up for .ir files. In Unix/Linux, it's much easier since any new kind of script can itself tell the kernel what's needed to run it, then that script automatically becomes a valid executable file.

you are right about apache... i havent used it in a long time. the network at my work and home (mine and the owners home) are connected Via a VPN so there is no big security hole with IIS and running stuff. (i run office startup proceedures from home and everything is fired up when i get here) However being open to the world as yours is it would be a concern to me.

 

[TuxCoder]

you are right about apache... i havent used it in a long time. the network at my work and home (mine and the owners home) are connected Via a VPN so there is no big security hole with IIS and running stuff. (i run office startup proceedures from home and everything is fired up when i get here) However being open to the world as yours is it would be a concern to me.

I hope by "open to the world" you mean "not private", and don't mean "exposed and vulnerable" ? I've never had any problems through my kernel-level firewall and minimal Apache config. Also, no unencrypted remote access (TELNET or FTP), it's all SSL (SSH and SFTP).

I could use a VPN if that's my goal but I like the extra flexibility with SSH and SFTP. SSH can be used to tunnel any protocol, and the most common example is the X11 protocol for remotely running graphical desktop apps.

 

[haertig]

Anyways, to try to get Apache to run it, you'll need to edit the Apache configuration to set up the .ir file type as a CGI script (and set the corresponding CGI directive for the relative "web" directory the file resides in).

From my (Unix) httpd.conf file, here's one way to force program execution:

<Directory /home/*/public_html/cgi-bin>
Options ExecCGI
SetHandler cgi-script
</Directory>

Should be similar on Windows boxes, although I've never installed Apache there and have no Apache vs. Windows experience. Windows would also need some type of file association to tell it what to do with an .ir file though. No need to point out the somewhat lax security of the above Apache directive. This is from an internal box with few users that are all trustworthy!

Installing a webserver for this task might be overkill. It depends on where you want to go with it. A small custom server would do the trick, but a webserver would give you great ease in expanding/modifying the tool ... at the expense of size and complexity. But at least you don't have to code Apache from scratch!