USB Infrared Receiver Looks Good Sitting In Your Livingroom

June 8, 2013 by Mike Szczys 7 Comments

usb-ir-receiver

The problem with building your own electronics for the living room is that the final product may not fit your decorating style. This was true with [Itay’s] prototype of a universal USB IR receiver. So after testing it out for a few weeks he decided to build a final version that started by selecting an enclosure he could be proud of.

He came across an LED flash light at the dollar store which has an aluminum body. When we read about this we envisioned a cheap version of a Mag Light from which he removed the cylinder that holds the batteries. But actually, the pod seen above is the entire flashlight (with an added base). It forced him to design a tiny surface mount PCB to fit everything inside.

It’s not too much of a stretch since IR receivers tend to be small anyway. [Itay’s] design put a PIC 18F2553 on one side of the board. The other side hosted the through hole components: an IR receiver, LED for feedback, and the connections for the USB cable that exit through the rubber button cover that used to switch the flashlight on. He had a problem with one of the resistor values which took a while to figure out. But eventually he got it working. It’s been in use now for six months.

IR Remote As PC Input

August 20, 2012 by Mike Szczys 13 Comments

As a learning experience [GeriBoss] put together an IR remote control receiver board for his PC. His want of volume control from across the room was reason enough to undertake the project, and he got to work with a 38 kHz receiver module and Manchester encoding in the process.

The decoder portion of the project is built around an ATtiny2313 chip. The external interrupt pin (INT0) is connected to a TSOP31238. When it decodes a valid remote code it pushes a character to the RS232 chip connecting to the computer’s serial port.

We think this is a wonderful accomplishment for [GeriBoss], but we encourage him to refine the design further. You’ll notice in the image there’s a USB port on the board which is only used to provide regulated power. We know it’s possible to use V-USB with the ATtiny2313 to add USB functionality and this would be a great way to learn about it. We’d also like to mention the resistor and capacitor suggested for filtering the IR receiver module signal. We’ve included the recommended application schematic for that part after the break.

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Control Media Center With Programmable IR Receiver

September 28, 2008 by Jason Rollette 9 Comments

This IR receiver based on ATtiny13 microcontroller is used to control a Media Center box via a remote. The circuit is powered by 20 pin ATX connector pin 9 “+5VSB” because it is the only pin that is powered when the computer is off, or in standby. The receiver is programmed to accept the codes from the remote by holding down the switch while pressing the remote button. The circuit can use “Girder” or “PC remote control” as controlling software on the Media Center.