Remote control question? (1 Viewer)

[David Preston]

I am looking for a remote I can control all my components with(which is easy) and also my ceiling fan. I have a remote control ceiling fan that I want to program on my HT remote. Is there a remote out there that I can buy that does this right out the box where I don't have to modify it. I understand I have to program it to do it.

 

[JamesCB]

Try this question at www.remotecentral.com . They might help more there.

 

[Jim Lenneman]

Unless your ceiling fan is IR controlled, you're out of luck. Can you control the fan from another room (through walls), if so it's RF, not IR. Very few IR controlled fans exist. No universal remote will control an RF device directly. Those universals advertised as RF capable only use RF to communicate to a base station which then retransmits the signal in IR. This gives you multi-room capability, but control is still done using IR not RF.

Jim L

 

[David Preston]

Jim you were right I can control my fan from another room. I never tried that before. Now I can play pranks on people. Do you know of any remotes that have the base station and capable of RF/IR transmitting? Thanks for making it so easy to figure it out.

 

[Jim Lenneman]

David,

You're welcome. The easiest/quickest solution for what you asked, is to go to Radio Shack and get a pair of their pyramids (sp?). With these you should be able to use whatever remote you currently have. Place one of them in the room with your remote and the other in the room that has the gear you want to control. What will happen is your remote will transmit IR, the 1st pyramid will pick it up, and retransmit the signal in RF. The second pyramid will receive the RF and retransmit the signal in IR to control your gear. There are other solutions as well.

Note: this still won't control your fan, we're talking A/V gear here which is still controlled by IR. The pyramids use RF ONLY to talk to the other pyramid that's in a different room. Not to control anything by RF. To my knowledge, there is NO off the shelf application that will allow you to control your fan (or any other RF gear) other than your OEM remote.

Jim L

P.S. If you really want a new remote that has an RF basestation, the Pronto TSU 3000 has one as an option, and the new (or about to be released) Mx 600 has this capability as well.

 

[David Preston]

What does one of those remotes you mentioned at the bottom cost? Thanks again for the info.

 

[Jim Lenneman]

David,

The Pronto with the optional RF base runs about $350, the 600 comes with the base and runs about $250. I'd probably recommend the 600 unless you really enjoy spending a lot of time learning to setup, play with graphics, and program a remote using the computer software. I'm a touchscreen (Pronto) guy and do enjoy this, many people don't.

Here's a link for both, note that the 600 is listed as a preorder, I'd probably call and find out why. http://www.bluedo.com/bluedocgi/prod...odel=MX-600PKG

Jim L

 

[David Preston]

Thanks Jim I'll have to wait until Christmas for that one. Looks like a nice remote and has a lot of features.