Slashdot Mirror
Turn your iPod into a Universal Remote
no_demons writes "Some clever souls over at engadget.com have posted an excellent tutorial in turning your iPod into a IR remote control. You also need a Pocket PC, an IR gadget from Griffin and a bit of patience, but hey, it's still a cool hack."
For only the cost of a PocketPC, iPod, and Griffin IR gadget you too can iPod your Slashdot! To be fair, you might not have to pay the $17 for the IR gadget from Griffen... You could just buy a kit from Radio Shack and DIY for $5 less!
This isn't a "cool hack" or even "news for nerds". This is incredibly lame, backwards, and expensive. Why bother to use all these devices when you could just use a $10 or less Universal Remote from Walmart with a lot less futzing?
A cool hack would be controlling your iPod via a $10 universal remote from Walmart.
The ultimate in laziness. Now I can use my iPod and remote at the same time.
It's a pad of paper. To turn it into a remote control, all you need is the pad of paper (of course) and a remote control.
However,
Now maybe my family won't fight for the remote so much, especially when I tell them that one wrong move turns it into a $300+ paperweight!
That would cause all kinds of fun at your local sports bar.
sulli
RTFJ.
so you need a PocketPC to get your iPod to be a remote... does this basicly run as a UI for you PocketPC for your PocketPC to be the remote?
i can run the mile at 65mph, i just need a car to do it with.
Hey, that's cool. And with this, you can turn your iPod into a car.
I guess "cool hack" is in the eyes of the beholder. To me, this sounds like a kludge (the Pocket PC, gadget and iPod). And all for what? That tired old, barely useful remote control "hack."
"...all the labours of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness..." yada yada
Griffin demoed the PodMate at the 2002 MacWorld Expo. They were controlling a Sony TV and Stereo at their booth with one of these devices. Apple asked them not to develop it further for some reason.
They scrapped the plans and then made it part of their Griffin Mobile division - selling it for the iPaq originally.
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
I'm not interested in the whole PocketPC process, but the fact that you can do it is awesome.
Slap together an IR "microphone" and do it yourself if you don't like their process. I don't plan on rushing out to buy a PocketPC to try this, but that it can be done is worth noting.
That what was all this school was for... to teach us how to solve our own problems. -- janeowit
1. Buy iPod.
2. But $10 universal remote from WalMart.
3. Use corner of universal remote to push iPod buttons and rotate volume dealy-widget.
So much more cool and high tech than using your primitve old finger.
--- Ban humanity.
Is that you can, apparently, just hook up an infrared transceiver to a standard 3.5mm earphone/microphone plug..
So really, you only need the infrared-tranceiver-plug and some software to record sound. You sample the "sound" that comes from the tranceiver, then plug it into lineout and play back..
Of course, you can also hook up a microphone to your TVs tranceiver, and just play the recorded sounds out loud. Kind of like an old school "clicker" remote control that worked by audio. In fact, you could probably, with enough training, learn how to shriek directly in television-ese!
Captain crunch would approve.
SCO employee? Check out the bounty
The remote control perpetually wins the category of "most dropped electronic device in a typical home." Good way to scratch the iPod.
No weapon in the arsenals of the world is so formidable as the will and moral courage of free men.-Ronald Reagan
A) Connect Pocket PC
B) Connect Other Device
C) Figure Out How to Connect IPOD
D) Write Slashdot Article
It's a neat hack, but it's a neat hack that doesn't require an iPod or a Pocket PC... just a Griffin IR transceiver (or a handmade one, though you're unlikely to be able to make one as cheap and compact) and something to record and play back the 'sound' of the IR.
...
Put the control signals in your ringtone, and turn your TV on by calling your cellphone. Use custom ringtones and call from different phones to change the channel, adjust the volume,
NO, the iPod is not turned into a universal remote .. the PocketPC is .. the iPod is just acting as an anoying chunk at the end of the damn PocketPC..
Wow, that sounds really convenient...
Say what you will, this still beats Sony's latest entry. in the remote-control realm on price, if not on coolness, functionality, ease of use, form factor or support.
Let's see....
Take a relatively expensive toy,
Add a big ugly knob,
Trade in a lot of your one-touch buttons for lots more scrolling.
Surf for a while, simmer and search for proper recorder hacks. Cross fingers, will serve a few, frustrate many.
But it's cool as hell. Looks like a headache, but I can't not try it.
http://actionPlant.com
This isn't a "cool hack" or even "news for nerds". This is incredibly lame, backwards, and expensive.
I think someone here doesn't understand what a 'cool hack' is. One of the things that can define a 'cool hack' is going the long way around to make a peice of technology do something that it wasn't originally intended to do, i.e.: installing linux on a dreamcast or connecting a cuecat to amazon.com.
Price never enters into it.
Technoli
We have all heard of those "One For All" remote controls. Well if you need all these different devices to use it ; isnt it more of a "All For One" system?
For some reason I'm thinking of the Dogtanian and the Three Muskehounds
Electronic Music Made Using Linux http://soundcloud.com/polyp
Now if they could only make your remote play MP3s....4 6&tid=159&tid=126&tid=129
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/07/27/02502
I'm not totally sure what this IR-to-audio device is, but couldn't you just line-in it to a regular PC (or a tape deck, even) and sound-record with that?
Information wants to be free.
Entertainment wants to be paid.
You just want to be cheap.
If you publish your IR commands are you violating DMCA? Who will be the first to have a catalogue of IR .mp3 files sued by Matsushita/Sony/JVC for DMCA violation? On the otherhand it could be another way for those companys to make money... charge a dollar per command?
Just spend a few bucks on software and you can use the pocket PC as a remote control now..
This 'make your ipod into a bla bla' is silly..
Its like killing termites with a flame thrower..
---- Booth was a patriot ----
It's really quite intuitive.
The premise is valiant. It seems like itching your left ear w/your right hand by going over the top of your head - why not just use the PDA to play the "sounds"?
I am waiting for the perfect convergence of all home electronics, appliances and climate/house controls "broadcasting" their capabilities (all with a lock-out, so my neighbor cannot turn on my stereo at 3am and play some Barry Manilow!) to a device (or PC), allowing a PDA-style remote to visually control them all (or even the web).
There are some very high-end AV/home controllers that do some of this, but I want more choices!
cool!
instead of requiring hardware to generate the sounds for you ? Sure it is lame enough that you can only store these generated pre-sets, but at least you can do away with the rest of the overhead. It would be a lot smarter to reprogram the ipod the generate the sounds instead of playing precorded sounds... that is all. :)
~ ddf ~
Would be interested to see someone float a thin client based on using the iPod as the user identification/storage component. Lots of ideas come to mind once you assume the iPod is ubiquotous.
I think someone here doesn't understand what a 'cool hack' is. One of the things that can define a 'cool hack' is going the long way around to make a peice of technology do something that it wasn't originally intended to do, i.e.: installing linux on a dreamcast or connecting a cuecat to amazon.com.
Installing Linux on a Dreamcast or connecting a CueCat to Amazon.com to link your personal collections (books, DVDs, whatever) is far more exciting than using existing pieces of technology to do something.
This is a piece of PocketPC software that is talking to a Griffin IR gadget which the iPod is controlling. Woofuckinghoo.
It is certainly not "cool" by any stretch of the imagination. All they did was use existing technology through several different hoops to get a simple task accomplished. I can't even fathom how you could place it in the same realm as the CueCat hacks or Linux running on hardware X.
Since most PocketPC systems have IR built in you could just stop there. Or you coul just spend 20$ and buy a remote. Why the hell would you want to drag an iPod into this I dont know. You may as well turn your car, toaster oven, or microwave into a remote.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
Just one more thing to keep us fat americans from having to get up to change the chanel.
I stole this sig.
Many IPAQs have a stronger then usual IR transmitter/receiver to be able to control your TV using the NEVO software, which comes with it. So I don't see the point of this!
this.showSig(false)
You went to the trouble of finding those links, but couldn't read the article to find out whether you were completely wrong about it?
First there's an article on a $700 Linux-based Remote Control, now this? Come on! The most expensive universal remotes seem to cost $250 - and I bet they work a lot better than this. Oh yeah, and you can replace the batteries in them too.
Nothing but the finest in meaningless drivel
if involving a ppc it would be less expensive to simply install a pcmcia microdrive into your ppc and use a freeware mp3 player... it already comes with a pretty decent universal remote control application... um duh?
~ ddf ~
I would guess Rube Goldberg isn't one your favorites?
Really, simply taking the long way around to do something that could be done in a much simpler fashion is cool in itself. It's like climbing Mt. Everest "because it's there," but without the frostbite and risk of freezing to death. And maybe it's a little easier.
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
If you take a $10 item, and modify it to replace a $1000 item, that's probably a good hack.
If you take a $1000 item, and modify it to replace a $10 item, that's not a good hack. That's just stupidity.
It takes no cleverness to waste money.
There is much pleasure in useless information.There is much pleasure to be gained in useless knowledge.
Really, all you technically need to _buy_ is the griffin remote thingy, nothing else. The pocketPC is only a one time thing from which you record the signals of the remote. If you had read the whole article, you would find that you could have done this using a computer as well.
You know what would be REALLY cool? Turn my remote into an iPod. Now there's a mod I could get into.
====
Crudely Drawn Games
I can't imagine the combination of boredom and wealth that would lead me to want to do this to an iPod. If you want something useful to hack, reverse engineer a Garmin GPS receiver so that I can modify one to calculate and show the coordinates of the target of a laser range finder. I'd rather use an existing piece of equipment like that instead of having to design and build my own.
Does anyone else find it kind of comical that Apple, the company that revolutionized "easy computing", simple interfaces, simple industrial design, etc has become a geek's haven for hacking? OS X with their BSD underpinnings gives the UNIX geeks so much to play with. Newton diehards are hacking the crap out of it to keep it "alive". People are hacking iPods in so many different ways. All this for a company that takes pride in their "we make computing easy for you". I wonder what will be hacked next. Guesses anyone?
"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lampposts...for support rather than illumination." - Andrew Lang
Hey, it's slashdot. Use the iPod anywhere, it gets front page status.
Incidentally, I control my life with the iPod. See, some days I just don't want to get up in the morning. Playing the second Queens of the Stone Age album on my iPod every morning at 7:30 makes sure I get to to work on time. Wow, what an amazing hack!
Hey freaks: now you're ju
Replacing the iPod with a bowl of grits? Or ham and cheese sandwich bought at the gas station?
Spend at least $249 for the Ipod, a couple of hundred for a pocket PC, etc. thats over $400 bucks for an IR only Universal, plus the time of putting it together. Not to mention the clunky interface, when you could buy THIS and controlly everything via RF + IR from anywhere in your house, plus a streamlined, easily programmable (from windows sorry) control interface (took me 10 minutes to set up DVD, Reciever, Cable BOX, and 3 TV's).
All you need is an iPod, an automobile, and some crazy glue! I love my AppleCar, and hope that you can appreciate my hack!
This project describes the most interesting part of this hack... converting the IR into a waveform in the first place. That Griffin gadget is fascinating.
The article talks about how you read off the IR codes in the first place, and convert them into usable waveforms. It uses C# targetted for PocketPC. I found the underpinnings of this hack far more interesting than the hack itself.
Duh, it's cool because it includes an iPod in the equation!
Why not put IR lasers on a Moon base and control all the sports bars? (It's what I like to call a "Death Star.")
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Reminds me of a Dale Gribble quote from King of the Hill:
"If you want, I can show you how to make a bomb out of a roll of toilet paper and a stick of dynamite."
Right... call me when I can turn a universal remote into an iPod.
Actually, it seems like it works by recording IR signals as audio, and then re-broadcasting by playing the sounds. Actually that's kind of interesting.
But, it would work with any Mp3 player, so it's a little annoying that they focused on the iPod exclusively, when any digital audio player would work.
It would also be a HUGE pain in the ass to actualy use, especialy if you've already got a pocket PC that could do all that already without all the work...
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
I didn't RTFA, could somebody quick recap how it is you can turn a PocketPC into an iPod? What is the point of doing this, exactly?
On the 0th day, God created C
I did read the article. You're using a Pocket PC (with remote control software loaded on it!) and using it to turn an iPod with the Griffin add-on into a remote control. I didn't bother to add the steps of also using a Mac/PC and iTunes. So you're right, I was wrong, I forgot to include an extra device and 2 more pieces of software.
just teach a frog to sing "stairway to heaven" and take that to the sports bar.
the problem is getting a brace of crickets to play guitars for realism.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Great, another $700 remote control
Jingling a ring of keys or pouring a handful of change from one hand to the other would operate the TV.
They only used the Pocket PC to record the remote-control waveforms. It's not specifically required, and only the iPod with the little IR transmitter is needed to use the remote. If a database of IR waveforms was developed, you technically would only need the IR adapter and download the correct set of audio files.
Yeah I tend to agree. It does have a neat concept to it, but definately more of a "some one has way to much free time" kinda thing...
Insert funny smart-ass comment here.
I'm so lazy, I use my iPod to start my call. Hell, it is going to have voice recognition and dial my cell for me soon!
I'm still waiting for somebody to hack my remote control into a mp3 player...
The poster claims its an XML compliant universal remote - although I couldn't find the information on the website (admitidally I only looked briefly).
One downside is that it's very expensive ($299) but one cool thing is that it has support for TV channel guides built into the remote.
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
I bought one of those and it works great if I'm in the next room, but is very unreliable once I went upstairs (this is in an all wood and drywall construction). I replaced it with a whole house ir distribution system that works like a champ with all the my original remotes.
"Why bother to use all these devices when you could just use a $10 or less Universal Remote from Walmart with a lot less futzing?"
To learn more about how the technology works?
How can you call yourself a nerd if you don't find the 'convert the IR to sound and back' process interesting?
"Derp de derp."
Maybe I'm missing something, but if you're going to buy an Pocket PC, why do you need the IR Gadget? My iPaq PPC has IR built in, and it's trivial to write a remote control program in Embeddeded C++ (or just download one). Then you don't even need the iPod. By the way, I can play music (ogg or mp3s) on my iPaq, as well as do spreadsheets, read e-books, do horoscopes etc...
Get a life, mate.
Ok that's cool but when are you going to turn an universal remote controller in an iPod? THAT would impress me!
But I would rather turn my toaster into a racoon.
www.facebook.com/DareDefendOurRights
www.fairtax.org
awful waste of space
awful waste of space
awful waste of space
A better idea is to reversee engineer the TV so that when you say "volume up" the volume would go up. I guess you could create a box that changes preprogrammed sound into a specific IR channel. i might try it...HMMM i wonder "Cat eat", "Cat change litter pan" thats what ill do, ill plug this griffin converter in to my cat!
"I think you know me, I think you like me"
Jesus fucking christ, people. You're like a bunch of five-year-olds. Huhuhuhuh... let's read the misleading summary and make fun of it!
The hack is to record the IR pulses as sound files and play them back with an IR LED connected to the iPod's headphone port. It's a really smart and cool idea but I guess you guys wouldn't know one of those if it bit you on your collective ass.
The reason the article calls for a Pocket PC is because it can read ifrared signals and pass those to the headphone jack for output. If you just piped the IR port on a computer to the sound out device, you'd have the same solution, minus the Pocket PC. This is NOT like the stupid-ass iPod to iPod transfer "hack" from a while ago. This is an actual neat concept that I'd wish you'd stop shitting all over with your ignorance.
Thank you.
Ok, the hack is pretty lame but the potential is cool.
For instance, you could create a playlist that turned on/off all of your equipment in a certain order - add to that: volume, channel defaults, recording options, xbox setting, dvd setting...
Add in a IR x10 system and you could Dim the lights, shut off the phone and load your pr0n DVD in one playlist.
The system is a pimp; and I refuse to be a whore -- Chuck D.
1. buy anything. 2. put ipod by it and claim it can do that with that stuff. come on, most palm/pocketpc can be easily turned into universal remote without the ipod.
I think you can also buy repeater modules,to extend the range, as well. What's the name of that IR distribution system? sounds cool.
Nevertheless, I bought this system because I got tired of fumbling through 4 to 5 remotes, and wanted to be able to use it outside on my deck.
you want a cool hack? try http://www.pixell.net/newton/
- Minutus cantorum, minutus balorum, minutus carborata descendum pantorum.
I have 3 stories and around 3000 ft^2 with the receiver in the middle floor near the center of the house. It worked fine from the middle floor, but was very flaky on the other floors specially as I moved away from the center of the house. As linear distance goes, it wasn't even close to 50ft from the receiver when it fails.
I replaced it with a home brew wired ir distribution that injects and extracts the ir signal on my home-run coax lines. I have receivers in each room injecting the signal into the coax and a trasmitter on my equipament rack receiving that signal and emitting the ir towards the equipament. The only problem with this is that now I now have DC current running through my coax lines and therefore need to be careful that the proper filter is in place before plugging in any equipament into the coax. www.smarthome.com has everything you need and decent descriptions, but not the best prices.
It would be cool if this were to take off, and someone created a database of the IR sounds for the most common remotes. Man, that would be cool.
I just found them a couple of months ago, I located a Component Video Distribution Box for my HD sets.
Now, show me a version using a Linux handheld, or a cheaper IR-to-audio gizmo, then I'll be impressed.
I figured out a way to turn an Airport Extreme station into a dirt hauling and delivery system! You'll also need a dump truck, some super glue, and a back hoe!
My next project involves making a blow torch into a toaster. Also required are an X-Y plotter, some hardware cloth, and a surveyor's transit.
I'd like to tell more, but I have to go to the can. Normally, I'd use toilet paper, but I figured out this thing with a power drill and a corn cob...
Not to mention, instead of all that, if you had an IPAQ to begin with you wouldn't even need the ipod for a remote with http://www.mynevo.com/nevo_pda.htm
Show me a version that uses a Linux-based device, or some cheaper IR-to-audio homebrew gadget, then I'll be impressed.
Actually, that's what this screams for- an IR *reciever* device to match the Griffin IR gadget. Griffin, are you guys paying attention here ?
I suppose it'd be even cooler if some enterprising EE type built a DYI IR send/recieve gadget for the iPod ( and provided me a schematic to copy ), now *that* would be cool. Still, you are using your iPod as a very, very expensive and not terribly intuitive remote, and can you listen to tunes while you do so ? Not unless your IR codes count as tunes... beep beepboopbop...
Interesting, sure. Cool ? well, *maybe* on /.
Practical or useful ? Uh... would you do it, or would you buy ( or build ) an actual programmable remote, so you could actually *use* your iPod ?
I think the problem is that for most people to consider a hack cool, it has to be more than making something do something new; It must also be useful. This, simply put, is not.
TIAEAE!
I thought frogs could only sign "Hello my darling, hello my baby, hello my ragtime gal?"
---
Lousy rotten karmic retribution.
The hack is to record the IR pulses as sound files and play them back with an IR LED connected to the iPod's headphone port. It's a really smart and cool idea but I guess you guys wouldn't know one of those if it bit you on your collective ass.
Maybe it was smart, but in the end, the summary is accurate: Take an iPod and an adapter and a Pocket PC and make something pedestrian out of it.
The only way this is "cool" is if it's a way to test an idea that might have some rational use. That might be the case. Otherwise, no matter how cleverly done, they still have just taken 2 very expensive things and combined them to do the job of one very inexpensive thing. That's just begging to be ridiculed.
Thank you.
Back under your bridge, you!
you CAN replace the battery on your iPod. If you couldn't, how would these guys be selling anything?
Let the "you can't replace the battery so it sucks" statement die, please.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Seems to me that a company (hint..hint..Griffin) could do a lot of the work and record as many remotes as possible so that someone could go download the "playlist" for the remote they need and sync it with their iPod. Add the IR adaptor and be ready to go... no need for the PocketPC then. Not sure what the legality of this would be, any ideas?
Did your friend spam slashdot too?
A cool hack would be controlling your iPod via a $10 universal remote from Walmart.
Ask and ye shall receive: an IR remote for the iPod, whose commands any old learning remote can memorize.
DiscDividers tabbed plastic CD dividers: divider cards f
eeehh lunix is teh whay of the lief. heh
First, this same thing can be done with any device able to play .wav or .mp3 files at equal sampling rates.
.wavs and remote specs: .wav files. I don't care how or with programming languages you implement the LIRC2WAV converter, but just do it, it is not hard. Just make a wav file with a sampling rate of 44.1 or 48 kHz, and use a carrier frequency of exactly half of the sampling rate. Make silent parts to a sample value of 0, and the carrier to go from -100% to +100% sample values (-32768 and +32767 if 16-bit samples). Then perhaps encode it through LAME with extreme settings so that the high frequency parts are preserved and not filtered away like normal MP3 encoders do.
Secondly, it is a coincidence the IR leds work on the audio output on this device, because it is propably designed to drive some high impedance loads such as headphones (around 600 ohms) or line level inputs in stereo systems (from 10 kohms to 100 kohms). And usually the IR leds are driven with 100 mA of current in order to have sufficient range, the iPod range will be quite limited compared to real remotes. And if the internal voltage of the iPod is 3 volts, the audio output has a theoretical maximum amplitude of 1.5 volts, and the forward voltage of IR leds is around 1.6 volts.
Another thing that would prevent this from working is that the infrared signals usually have a carrier signal of around 30 to 40 kHz (32 kHz Denon,Panasonic,Philips, 40 kHz Sony, 38 kHz some manufacturers), and with a sampling rate of 44.1 kHz, the maximum frequency that a sampled signal can have is 22.05 kHz (see google for "Nyquist theorem" if you don't believe me). Many IR receivers are sensitive to this and don't work without the correct carrier frequency, at least the range is very limited then. Though not all systems use the carrier at all, so then this would work perfectly, but these are rare (some Finlux televisions).
And the IR module you suggested is definitely a bad one, because it removes the carrier signal and only the baseband signal is on the output pin. The IR phototransistor will work fine, as long as the signal amplitude is good enough, maybe the microphone input has enough gain for this.
Yet more problems lie when the audio is recorded.. The DC offset (and very low frequencies) should be removed.
And for all you who are whining to get the prerecorded
Go to the Linux Infrared Remote Control site LIRC and see the link "All supported config files". Sure, you need a converter to make your button information to
There you have it. Sorry for being so pessimistic, but I am having a bad day, and I really am an university student majoring in electronics and my current employer wants me to research infrared data transmission and control so I think you will find these handy..
- Jeppe Jääkarhu
And "For All You Do, This Bud's For You."
sulli
RTFJ.
The part of it that makes it not cool to me is that you need a PocketPC which we all know can act as an IR remote with the right software (and in this case I guess hardware). Would have looked way cooler if they had said "Use your ipod to control your pocketPC remotely" since thats the sort of interesting part of this. I don't know, I think I'm with you on the "big deal" front. Now if they had interfaced the IR directly with the ipod and hacked the ipod software to run it that would be far cooler in my book.
"You can now flame me, I am full of love,"
haven't tried it yet, but I am pretty sure you could record the IR using AUDACITY, a nice GPL'd sound editor. http://audacity.sourceforge.net/ - incidentally (and coincidentally) it's the SF.net project of the month for 7/2004.
I don't even get why the iPod is there, given that you have to buy another processor and the IR transceiver. Heck, I could duct tape this stuff to my car, or a broom, or my cat, and submit an article about hacking them into a remote. The iPod has nothing to do with it.
Or flip it around, and submit articles about duct taping my iPod to a microwave (use hacked iPod to heat snacks!) or to the hood of a truck (use hacked iPod to tow boats!)
Apple Computer, Inc. (AAPL), beset by angry creditors and faced with severe G5 production problems, is on the verge of bankruptcy and total collapse. Apple continues to nosedive into oblivion, as confirmed by industry watchers, investors, and, most painfully, by customers themselves.
As a recent study by Bank of America Securities puts it, Apple ekes out its small existence by peddling new hardware to its existing customers; once those customers are satisfied, Apple will run out of steam . If these disastrous financial forecasts aren't enough, one need only look to Netcraft for confirmation that Apple's market share among Web servers is slowly dwindling down to zero. The market share of Mac OS X is now eclipsed even by that of FreeBSD, another OS that is deeply imperiled.
But the abysmal server presence of OS X is the least of Apple's worries. Apple's most recent quarterly report indicates a death spiral of cash loss. Indeed, Apple has hemorrhaged some $276 million in the last quarter, while racking up a dizzying $2.4 billion in debt. Revenue from sales of the iPod, the portable music player that is barely keeping Apple afloat in this shipwreck of fiscal woe, declined dramatically, threatening to shrink further an already miniscule lifeline.
Likewise, sales of the eMac, iMac and Power Macintosh G5 lines continue to skid. Apple is unable to secure G5 processors in sufficient numbers tosupply its customers with Power Macintosh G5 and iMac computers, as Steve Jobs himself recently admitted. The staggering decline in sales numbers confirms it: there is no doubt that one-time Apple customers, dismayed with the floundering ineptitude of their favorite company, have begun turning away in droves, seeking cheaper, faster hardware from manufacturers such as Dell.
Apple teeters on the precipice of doom, one step away from plummeting to its ultimate nadir of bankruptcy, chaos, and implosion. Wise investors will quickly dump AAPL stock and abandon the doomed company, now less than one year away from complete disintegration.
It's time to move to a new platform: Apple is dead.
I agree that if it reqired the PocketPC, it would be stupid, but the PocketPC is just being used for the sake of making the task of recording IR easy with no software voodoo. I think the idea of using an iPod to control a lot of elements in a complex home entertainment setup is very cool and very useful.
If people were really interested in this functionality, they could share the library of IR control code audio files.
;-) (Wonder if the radiologists in their medical school use iPods for carrying medical image files like our radiologists do?).
General musings on iPod recording capabilities etc (from one successfully using an MD Walkman for years of pro audio recording):
A) Wonder if the 8 Khz recording bandwidth of the iPod would be enough to record the IR pulses directly? (Lessee, I got a homebrew [Radio Shack plan and parts] IR detector around here, throw a 1/8" jack on the output and plug into the Belkin Universal Microphone Adapter for iPod....)
B) Bug Steve-o about the wisdom allowing 44.1 Khz stereo recording on iPod. What the hell, I'm gonna buy a high-end Sony Hi-MD Walkman ANYWAY since he won't go for it....
C) Four easy steps for making my professional school lectures available to students on-line: 1) Record lectures on iPod using lavalier mic; 2) Drop audio file and exported lecture Powerpoint JPEGs into iMovie; and 3) edit and export to CD or class Web server. 4) There is no step 4....
D) Of course, at 8 KHz the iPod recorded audio won't be as crisp as what I get off my MD Walkman. On the other hand, I eliminate the step of importing narrative audio files through a pro MD deck with optical S/PDIF outputs.
E) Yeah, Duke is SO lame for giving incoming students iPods
Hardware hacking 4 ever.
*prepares to lose karma* *ahem* You must be new here. Thank you, thank you, I'll be here all week.
You could use just about any device that can record and play back a sound wave to do this. I think now they mass-produce chips that let you record a short soundclip and play it back. You could use one of these (or any mp3 player, or even casette player, etc) to imitate a sequence of button-presses from multiple remotes. This could be useful for someone who just wants to watch a DVD rather than juggleing remotes so he can get to the correct screen.
Why not just use a $30 MP3 player instead of the "trendy" iPod? ... nevermind guess I answered my question.
Good point. I guess the way I look at it is this: Doing something wacky with hardware is all OK by me, but if I were doing it, I'd expect to take some shit for it. :)
I do think there's value in doing something just for the sake of doing it. I also think it's OK to like what someone does while also giving them a hard time about it. It still seems impractical to me.
The hack is to record the IR pulses as sound files and play them back with an IR LED connected to the iPod's headphone port. It's a really smart and cool idea but I guess you guys wouldn't know one of those if it bit you on your collective ass.
It was a cool and novel idea WHEN OTHER PEOPLE HAD IT BEFORE THEM.
THE WHOLE AUDIO to IR THING IS WHAT'S ALREADY BEING DONE WITH THE POCKET PC.
This "hack" is just plain lame. Griffin's stuff is doing all the work. The ipod is doing NOTHING useful in the equation. All the conversion is being done on the pocket pc. The "IR" signal is ALREADY coming out of the pocket pc's AUDIO port.
This cool "hack" consists of nothing more than a guy going:
"Hey I can record whatever's coming out of the audio port on my pocket pc with my ipod and play it back later!"
To me, and I would bet a great many others, this is painfully obvious.
I would much rather read something interesting, like how to replicate the frequency doubler inside the Griffin transmitter.
Life is too short to proofread.
If you believe that apple is doing so terribly i will buy all your stock in apple at 5$/Share. given that you believe that apple is in such terrible shape you should be overjoyed that someone would pay you soooo much money for a worthless stock. if you don't have any stock than you can just buy 500 shares at market price and i will gladly pay you 5$/Share also if you have a G5 or Imac ill buy that from your for 100.00$ that riiight 100.00$ American dollars, you should be overjoyed that someone would pay so much for such a worthless computer. funny though last i heard apple payed off all of its debts spent 2bln in research and still poses a 200mil+ profit for the year.
I did explain that you don't need the Pocket PC. I also said that if you did, then it would be very lame.
Since you can use palm pilots as universal remotes already
The simple answer is that iPod owners all have a monster case of buyer's remorse, and eagery sieze upon things which might help them argue it was worth $400 when you can just buy a $40 CD Walkman and have as much music as you can listen to in a day, and batteries that last longer than 8 hours. I never said it was a worthwhile hack, I just thought it was interesting and a step above the typical "look I can put words on my iPod" style of hack. The iPod's still and overpriced hunk of yuppie bling.
Isn't this plain racism?
From a Québécois in Québec.
This sounds like an implementation from some half-baked idea on halfbakery.com.
Anyone got a 3rd gen iPod to try this? I have a 2nd gen.
I've done some research, now griffin were demonstrating this working on the ipod and its rather obvious that they have just taken the some technology and chucked it on a pocket pc rather than it write off. If someone could provide/leak/build the software there would be no reason to use a pocket pc at all!
the "FreeBSD, another OS that is deeply imperiled" line makes me think you're joking, but the entire tone, and i doubt anybody is a freak enough to write out some long seriously-toned joke like this, makes me believe you're one of those windows users that hate macs "just cuz." idiot.
or maybe you're one of those 40-somethings that haven't a clue about computers (everyone in it/tech support knows about 'em) but seems to think they have an opinion, telling people the 20-year-old phrase "ibm's are what's in the real world." but then again, i don't think a 40-year-old would have the energy to rant like this.
apple is debt-free, made a heap of profits last quarter, and has upward of $4 billion in the bank. wtf are you talking about?
Hey, if enough people got together and traded signals for different remotes then you could have a website where you could just look up your remote model and then download the playlist for it. Kind of like a CDDB for remotes...
All you would have to have then would be the $10 piece of hardware and no iPaq, etc.
[Please type your sig here.]
> Otherwise, no matter how cleverly done, they still have just taken 2 very expensive things and
> combined them to do the job of one very inexpensive thing. That's just begging to be ridiculed.
Yea your pretty much right.
Apple took two very expesive things (A macintosh computer, and a custom hardware device called an iPod) and combined them to do the job of an inexpensive thing (walkman, discman, personal PC built with $50 of parts) and we all saw how rididculed the iPods were... Of course we see how well they sell too..
Maybe I'm missing something, but if you're going to buy an Pocket PC, why do you need the IR Gadget?
You don't.
Usually, however, the IR gizmos built in to devices for communication purposes are rather limited in transmission power, and sometimes in what kind of waveform or frequency you can abuse them to outputting/reading, so the gadget is there mostly for extending the range.
The iPod enters the equation only because it can, though IMHO is useless and stupid. iPod can play audio files? WOW, I'd never have guessed.
Yes, that's true.
This, however, is not a cool hack even in that sense of the word. iPod doesn't do anything that it wasn't originally intended to do, it just plays audio files. IR gizmo doesn't do anything it wasn't intended to do, either. Considering neither of the devices used in this operation are doing anything else than they're supposed to do, it's not a hack at all.
It would be a hack if they'd built the IR gizmo themselves, though even still it's so simple concept I would't call even that a cool hack.
You can get an IPod for free here, bringing it down to a reasonable level of expense - much cheaper that $50 Remote Commandors and the like.
Cash prize, guaranteed!