Hauppauge IR blaster

[gazoo]

Does the range on this blaster suck, or is it my imagination. I haven't moved my gbpvr boxes out of bench testing and into production (so to speak) yet. I am currently using a spare STB and I had to actually tape the blaster to the receiver eye in the STB. I really can't afford to do that on the production setup because it will block my real remote's functioning.

Are there any tips to get this thing running better?

[martint123]

I have a feeling it is a normal red LED and it's IR range is measure in microns.

I changed the LED woth one from an old remote and it was much, much better.

[sgilani]

The IR blaster should be 'transparent'. You're supposed to attach it directly to your STB, and your remote should still work just fine (the blaster should not block out the signal from your remote)

[gazoo]

I don't use the livetv for gbpvr. I used it to schedule pay channel recordings after we are away from the area (at night usually). During the day time, we use the stb with gbpvr in standby or shut off. The blaster merely tunes the stb for recording. So that's why I need the blaster not covering up the ir receiver on the stb.

Is that IR changeout hard? or just get an IR led from radio shack and do it? 2 leads? + and -?

[martint123]

Is that IR changeout hard? or just get an IR led from radio shack and do it? 2 leads? + and -?

Yup, easy, just the two wires. The current limiting resistor is on the board. The only thing to go wrong is getting the +/- wrong way round.

Hint: you can see if an IR LED is flashing by watching on a digital camera viewfinder - they seem to be sensitive to IR.