Programming Kameleon remote arrow keys for Net-Tune

[guido331]

1. Device: Onkyo TX-NR801
2. Type of device: Receiver
3. Year: 2003 (approximate)
4. JP1 Remote model: Radio Shack 15-2133 Kameleon (2k eeprom)
5. JP1 user? Yes
6. Still have original remote? Yes
7. Checked the file section? Yes
8. Checked Pronto file section (at R/C)? Yes
9. Partially working setup code? Yes - 1298
10. Learning remote question? sort of

My Onkyo TX-NR801 receiver has a feature called Net-Tune, which lets me stream MP3 files straight from a Windows file share on the same LAN. I have my Kameleon remote programmed with code 1298 which controls the volume, source, etc on the receiver just fine. It will not, however, control the Net-Tune functions. The original remote (an RC-511M) has a rocker button in the middle that lets me navigate through my MP3 collection (arrow up, down, left, right, select, etc). The corresponding arrow and select buttons, of course, don't work on the Kameleon. I've tried learning them on the Kameleon but have had no luck with this. (tried the standard learning troubleshooting: dark room, new batteries, etc).

I have a JP1 cable and can connect to my Kameleon with IR.exe. (I uploaded the current file from my kameleon here) I'm a beginner with this but it looks like I could use a Key Move to manually assign the arrow and select keys on the Kameleon the correct frequency (or whatever it is called) for the arrow and select keys from my Onkyo remote. The problem is I can't get the Kameleon to learn the keys from the Onkyo remote so I'm pretty sure they have to be manually recreated. I've looked around as best as I could but was unable to find any files specific to my Onkyo remote or Net-Tune navigation.

Can anybody please help out with this?

[The Robman]

Audio/1298 uses the NEC1 Combo protocol with 210 as the main device code. I haven't checked yet but I'm guessing that the sub-devices used are 108 and 109, which are the typical codes used for Onkyo audio receivers, so you might find the code for the missing buttons in one of the Onkyo receiver files.

[johnsfine]

Can your Kameleon learn signals from any other remote?

Those Onkyo signals should not be a problem to learn. Most likely you are doing something wrong in the learning process. If you can't learn from other remotes, that would say it's nothing specific to the Onkyo.

But if it is specific to the Onkyo, there's still one learning process mistake it might be:
If you press the Onkyo button before the Kameleon really starts to learn, that will cause the learn to fail. But with many other original remotes learning will usually work despite the mistake of pressing the original remote button too soon.

When learning, pause at least a fraction of a second after the last step of starting the Kameleon learning before pressing the Onkyo button you want to learn.

[guido331]

My Kameleon can learn from other remotes. It just won't learn from the Onkyo. Here's what I've done in trying to learn from the Onkyo remote:

Went into a windowless room (bathroom) and turned off all lights. Set both remotes on the counter about an inch away from each other with the transmitters and receivers facing each other. On the Kameleon I pressed the Audio button, pressed the "P" button until it blinked and pressed 975. I then pressed the Up arrow on the Kameleon and it went dark. I pressed and held the up arrow on the RC-511M (which has a red LED at the top that lights when it is transmitting). The Kameleon comes back on about a second later with one long blink. From the manual this means the learning procedure was a failure.

This is why I think I need to somehow replicate those button presses from the RC-511M in IR.exe and download them to the Kameleon. I looked around in the Onkyo files on this website but none seemed to be specifically for my TX-NR801.

[The Robman]

Some other things to check. First, verify that the batteries in both remotes are fresh. Next, when you place both remotes flat on a surface, see if the IR-LEDs are at about the same level. The Kameleon is kinda slim, so it's quite possible that it's IR-LED is at a lower level than the IR-LED in the Onkyo remote, so the IR signals might be going over the Kameleon. Even though this sounds unlikely, I have seen it happen, so I know it can occur. The solution to this would be to hold one of the remotes in your hand so that it can "see" the other remote.

[johnsfine]

I looked at your Kameleon.ir file. Earlier I hadn't expected that to be relevant to the learning failure.

The learning memory is full. That's the reason you can't learn more signals.

Try deleting a few of the learned signals (replace them with KeyMoves) to get room to learn more.

When IR.exe says "11 free" for Learned memory, it means 11 bytes, not 11 signals. One signal is likely more than 11 bytes.

Learned signal size varies a lot. Your 22 signals total over 1000 bytes, which is unusually large. Several of them are badly learned, which is both the reason they take more room than they should and another reason they would work better as KeyMoves. All but DVD:M2 are well enough learned to use the decode info to create KeyMoves.

[The Robman]

I've taken a closer look at the buttons that make up the Audio/1298 setup code and they combine functions from NEC1 210.108, 210.109 and 210.43. The non-working arrow buttons use 210.43, which further re-enforces my earlier suggestion that you just need codes from the 210.109 and 210.108 device codes.

The URC-9960 Kameleon has three other setup codes that might be worth looking at for this. They are...

Audio/0135 = NEC1 210.109
Audio/0842 = NEC1 210.108
DVD/0627 = NEC1 210.43

Audio/0135 has the same codes assigned to the volume, channel, DSP and TEST buttons as audio/1298. Audio/0842 has the same codes assigned to the POWER and INFO buttons as audio/1298.

I'm betting that the arrow buttons under audio/0135 will work for you.

[guido331]

Thanks for the suggestions. I'll try deleting some learned codes when I get home. I've had the remote a few years and used it with different devices so I'm not surprised it has run out of memory. Kinda funny actually..

About the learning issue, both remotes have new batteries, are aimed correctly (same height, IR eyes can see each other, etc.). I'll bet almost certainly it has to do with the memory issue described above.

How do I know what I can delete from my IR file without screwing up my remote?

[The Robman]

You already have a saved copy of your current IR file, so you can use IR to delete all of the learned signals. Then you can use the remote to capture the signal info for the buttons in question with a view to including them as part of a new upgrade or programming the functions via keymoves. When you're done, you're free to re-load the current IR file which would restore all of the learned buttons.

[The Robman]

I just noticed that you have the 15-2133 Kameleon as opposed to the URC-9960 Kameleon. Unfortunately, that means that you won't be able to test the setup codes that I posted earlier as they're not available in the 15-2133, although I see that audio/0135 has been added as an upgrade so you can test that one.

However, once you clear out your learning memory, you will be able to learn all of the buttons from your Onkyo remote which in turn will enable you to create an upgrade for it.

[guido331]

One quick question...

When I view the same IR file I see:

Move/Macro: 211 free
Upgrade: 718 free
Learned: 296 free

I'm running IR.exe version 6.15. Again, I'm by far no expert, but doesn't that mean I should have plenty of room to learn new stuff? I realize this isn't the case since I found out yesterday my remote can't learn anything, not just commands from my Onkyo remote. (ie, every learn attempt just gets one long flash instead of two short ones)

[The Robman]

You have somehow managed to get IR to use the 4k version of the RDF, whereas your IR file only contains 2k of memory. When you installed the IR.exe program, did you unzip the entire contents of the RDF zip file, or did you just pick and chose the RDFs that you thought you would need?

[guido331]

Nope, I downloaded and extracted the entire ZIP. I can re-download though if that would help.

[johnsfine]

I'm using IR version 7.00beta3 so differences between what I see and what you see might represent bugs fixed in IR.exe since 6.15, but Rob's theory about the rdf files sounds more likely.

[guido331]

Wierd... I just downloaded and extracted the zip for IR.exe again and it still has the same numbers.

There aren't supposed to be any subdirectories, right? Everything extracted to the same directory. Also when I open the IR file the title bar says:

Radio Shack 15-2133 Kameleon (2K eeprom)

Something's goofy here...