Looks Like I Bought The Wrong Remote?

jseymour · Post by **jseymour** » Tue May 22, 2018 8:36 am

Hi yaworski

I like the shrink tubing over the emitters. I think I've got some big enough for that.

Thanks for the MiBox programming info!

Re: The protocol: Hmmm... Well, maybe there's hope, yet, then. Maybe the GE/Jasco is doing something weird that's confusing the MX-500, and what I can do with either irScrutinizer or a OARUSB04G won't? Seems like a long shot, but, what the heck: I'm retired. I have time. And none of this stuff is terribly expensive.

Barf · Post by **Barf** » Tue May 22, 2018 2:04 pm

yaworski wrote:... The link above shows a different demodulating receiver but I couldn't find it easily in my country so I've used TSOP38438, as it's electrically compatible with TSOP34438 and it also has the same package size and type as the TSMP58000 so they both look identical (TSOP34438 is bigger).

For sure. IIRC, the TSOP34438 has a higher quality lens than the simpler and cheaper 38438. However, the benefits of a high-quality lens on an IR-sensor is not at all clear to me... Anyhow, I like the look of the 344*, and having the demodulating and the non-demodulating sensor look clearly different is an advantage.

The gray shrink tube hides three color LEDs, because I've used 5 V ready ones (with built-in current limiting resistor) and they are quite bright, so I've had to do something to make them less annoying . I'll need to replace them with some smaller ones.

Be creative!! What the current project lacks is a neat housing, preferably translucent so that holes are not needed.

binky123 · Post by **binky123** » Tue May 22, 2018 3:32 pm

Another thought is to modify the Xiaomi MiBox to accept a different IR protocol. I usually see NEC1 in the android remote.conf files posted in this forum. NEC1 is probably easier for the MX-500 to learn.

jseymour · Post by **jseymour** » Tue May 22, 2018 10:20 pm

binky123 wrote:Another thought is to modify the Xiaomi MiBox to accept a different IR protocol. I usually see NEC1 in the android remote.conf files posted in this forum. NEC1 is probably easier for the MX-500 to learn.

Huh. Didn't occur to me that was possible.

yaworski · Post by **yaworski** » Wed May 23, 2018 12:38 am

binky123 wrote:Another thought is to modify the Xiaomi MiBox to accept a different IR protocol. I usually see NEC1 in the android remote.conf files posted in this forum. NEC1 is probably easier for the MX-500 to learn.

You're probably thinking about modifying the /etc/remote.conf file, which controls the IR receiver on AMLogic boards. I don't think this is possible with the MiBox, even though it uses the same SoC as the cheaper Android STBs and sticks.

First of all, gaining root on MiBox is not that easy. It uses official, certified Android TV (not just a standard Android like the rest of AMLogic devices) and is not pre-rooted. There's no known rooting solution for current versions of firmware.
To get root, you'd need to downgrade the box to a leaked developer firmware version, which is older than any official firmware for the box. It has a userdebug enabled so the root can be gained quite easily using adb.
There's also a leaked Nougat beta build 1028, which also seems to be a userdebug enabled, but I think it has some issues with Youtube. There's also a risk of loosing DRM keys (used by Youtube, Netflix and built-in Chromecast) when downgrading back from Nougat to Marshmallow.
Of course by flashing other firmware version that these two above, you loose any modification you've done using root, so you're stuck with these versions.

Another issue is that most AMLogic devices use a software mode in the remote.conf file and the file then describes the NEC protocol. MiBox uses a hardware more, which probably means that it has additional hardware sitting between the SoC and the receiver, which implements the protocol and passes an already decoded data to the SoC. This would mean that there's probably no way to switch to NEC on this box. On the other hand, having root would probably allow to extend the key mapping with additional keys (still using MiBox protocol).

jseymour · Post by **jseymour** » Wed May 23, 2018 8:26 am

yaworski wrote: You're probably thinking about modifying the /etc/remote.conf file, which controls the IR receiver on AMLogic boards. I don't think this is possible with the MiBox, even though it uses the same SoC as the cheaper Android STBs and sticks.

First of all, gaining root on MiBox is not that easy. It uses official, certified Android TV (not just a standard Android like the rest of AMLogic devices) and is not pre-rooted. There's no known rooting solution for current versions of firmware.

That's what I figured, which is why it never occurred to me you might be able to alter the IR protocol.