On the MoBo of my new PC I have (amongst others) two headers:
IR (which presumably is for IRDA) CIR
AIUI IRDA is for two way communication between smart devices and has a properly structured open standard protocol stack. CIR is for remote controls and has no standards as such (although the most common proprietary protocols seem to be fairly well known) - it is just a serial bit stream to pass key strokes from a remote control to a consumer electronic device such as a TV or HiFi component.
Now I would like to use the PC as a Home Theatre component and use a remote control. However there is only one US company which seems to produce CIR receiver/transmitters
This has a 7 pin connector and the AsRock only has 4 pins. There is talk of adapting this at
There is a supposed DIY solution described at
Further confusion (at least to me) comes from the fact that the IR and CIR headers seem to be very much the same on the AsRock board.
CIR IR
----- -----
+5VSB +5VSB TX TX RX RX GND GND DummyThe CIR is a 4 pin single strip, and the IR is a 6 pin double strip with one hole blanked.
In the AVSForum schematics for the CIR 7 pin connector there seems to be a pin for RX (CIR input) but no connection to the LED pin for TX as specified in the Inset thread, so I don't know if you would need two IR devices (such as the discontinued Farnell component) to be able to transmit as well as receive.
So all in all I seem to have two slightly conflicting sources (for example the AVSForum device doesn't seem to need an extra power pin off the USB header) with no eaxct match.
Potentially the best solution would be to get the Intest device and then map the pins to the 4 pins on my MoBo if I can resolve the power issue.
In that case I assume that the neatest solution is to get a 4 pin Molex(?) connector to fit the mother board 4 pins, and either rewire from the 7 pin socket or get another 7 pin+blank plug and make up an adapter cable so I don't have to hack the original part about.
Why am I going to all this trouble? Well with an HTPC it is nice to be able to power up and power down via the CIR, and also control it like an audio or video player from a remote control instead of needing a keyboard and mouse at all times. Also, because the headers are on there and I would like to try and use them. I know the easy route would be to buy an external sensor and connect it to a USB port but it would be nicer to integrate the IR into the case.
Cheers
Dave R