HOWTO: setup the VFD & IR of Zalman HD160 case

[falela]

I have recently built my MythTV on Kubuntu Edgy (my first ever linux) in a Zalman HD160 enclosure. This case comes with a VFD/IR module made by IRTrans. I have been googling on how to enable this little piece of hardware, and the only info I found is this.
IRTrans provides linux drivers on their website. Base on the info from the mythtvtalk forum, and a little bit of messing around with the source code, I finally get the hardwares to work.
note: all the commands below are for Debian based distro . If you are using other distro, you are on your own, as I don't know anything about their commands.

Prerequisite

If you are using a 64 bit system, download the 32 to 64 bit compatibility libraries:

sudo apt-get install ia32-libs libc6-i386 libc6-dev-i386

Get the checkinstall package:

sudo apt-get install checkinstall

Install the softwares

IR Server
This is the daemon for receiving the IR signal. According to the README, it replaces the lirc daemon, so you can stop the lircd daemon. Since I don't have other IR device, I don't have any issue stopping it. If that is not the case for you, you need to check if this irserver is compatible. The last command below pevents lircd from autostart on boot up.

cd /etc/init.d
sudo lirc stop
sudo update-rc.d -f lirc remove

Don't uninstall it, as the extra tools offered by lirc, e.g. irw, irexec, are quite useful.

Download the compiled version of the server. Decompress the package and copy the program (irserver) to /usr/sbin/ directory:

tar -xvzf irserver.tar.gz
chmod 766 /path to irserver/irserver
sudo cp /path to irserver/irserver /usr/sbin

Create a 'remotes' directory, this is where the server stores the remote control configuration:

sudo mkdir -p /usr/local/share/irtrans/remotes

You can create this remotes directory in several other places: /etc/irserver/remotes, /usr/share/irtrans/remotes, or ~/.irtrans/remotes. Putting it where is up to you, but I don't recommend putting it in ~/.irtrans/remotes as the server has no access right to your home during system bootup. Thus, making auto-start fails.
Note: Make sure you have only one remotes directory (out of the 4 options above) in your system.

To test run the server, do the following but substitute x with the correct usb port #:

irserver -codedump -debug_code -loglevel 4 /dev/ttyUSBx

Press any button on the remote, you should see some printout on the terminal. Now it is time to setup the remote control.

Learning the remote control
Download the ASCII client off the IRTrans website. The executable is already included in the zip. With the irserver running, run the irclient:

cp /path to irclient/
sudo chmod +x irclient
sudo ./irclient localhost

The steps to learn the remote are:

1. Select "2 - Learn" to start learning.
2. Select "1 - Select remote", I enter 'Zalman' for mine.
3. Select "2 - Learn Timing". Just press any button on the remote.(note: I am not sure if this step is necessary.)
4. For each button on the remote, do "3 - Learn Command [Based on timing]". Enter the command name, then press the button on the remote that maps to this name.
   Note: The server treats the volume knob on your case as 2 IR codes, so you need to learn those as well
5. After you finish, select "99 - Exit" twice to exit

Note: I have yet to find out the difference between item 3 (Based on timing) and 4 (Command with timing). If someone know, please drop me a note.

A Zalman.rem file is created in /usr/local/share/irtrans/remotes/ directory. I include a copy of my Zalman.rem config here, in case you don't want to mess with this learning part. I also have a lircrc to use with MythTV. I grabbed this off the web, and make some changes to match my button names. (thanks Jarod Wilson and Hugo van der Kooij for the config file). Copy the lircrc to ~/.mythtv/ directory.
These configs are by no mean perfect. You certainly need to tweak it to suit your need.

Remove the .txt extension from these files before using them.
Zalman.rem.txt
lircrc.txt

LCD daemon
This is actually a forked version of the lcdProc package, so uninstall lcdproc if you have it:

sudo apt-get uninstall lcdproc

Download the IRTrans lcdproc driver source code and untar it:

tar -xvzf /path to saved tar/lcdproc.tar.gz

Configure with the irtrans driver, compile and install:

cd /path to saved tar/lcdproc
./configure --enable-drivers=irtrans
make
sudo checkinstall

checkinstall will ask you some questions about the package (lcdproc). Just enter lcdproc in the description field. The default version number is messed up (don't know why), change it back to 0.4.3.

The daemon LCDd is installed in /usr/local/sbin, and the client lcdproc is in /usr/local/bin

Using checkinstall to install giving you the ability to uninstall it with your distribution's standard package management utilities(Adept or Synaptic).

Modify the LCD configuration file, it is in the same directory you type checkinstall in. Use your favorite editor, I use nano here:

nano LCDd.conf

Find this entry in the [server] section and make the change:

Foreground=no

Chnage other settings (Heartbeat, backlight) according to your preference.

Copy this file to the /etc directory:

sudo cp /path to saved tar/lcdproc/LCDd.conf /etc

Make the servers autostart

You can auto start modules by putting the sysV init script in /etc/init.d directory. Use /etc/init.d/skeleton as a template. Here are the 2 scripts I use, remove the .txt extension and copy them to /etc/inid.d/.
irserver.txt
LCDd.txt

sudo cp irserver /etc/init.d
sudo cp LCDd /etc/init.d

Make the scripts executable:

sudo chmod 766 /etc/init.d/irserver
sudo chmod 766 /etc/init.d/LCDd

Make them autorun when boot up:

sudo update-rc.d -f irserver start 97 2 3 4 5 .
sudo update-rc.d -f LCDd start 98 2 3 4 5 .

Notes the . at the end. I set the scripts with sequence codes 97 and 98, so that irserver script starts before LCDd script (LCDd depends on irserver).

Reboot and check if these 2 daemons start:

ps -e | grep LCDd
ps -e | grep irserver

MythTV

Run mythfrontend, go to Setup > Apperance > LCD device display. Enable LCD device. That's it

Enjoy!

[timothyp]

Hi,

I'm using an ASUS EPC945-m8 Barbone system as a MythTV front end.
I can't seem to configure LCDProc to use the built in VFD (what is the meaning of VFD btw?) LCD display.

I think the LCD belongs to a company called Weltrend
The usb id is 040b:7000 as shown by lsusb

Bus 005 Device 003: ID 0aec:3260 Neodio Technologies Corp. 7-in-1 Card Reader
Bus 005 Device 001: ID 0000:0000  
Bus 004 Device 002: ID 040b:7000 Weltrend Semiconductor 
Bus 004 Device 001: ID 0000:0000  
Bus 002 Device 002: ID 0471:0815 Philips 
Bus 002 Device 001: ID 0000:0000  
Bus 003 Device 002: ID 045e:0083 Microsoft Corp. Basic Optical Mouse
Bus 003 Device 001: ID 0000:0000  
Bus 001 Device 004: ID 03f0:0024 Hewlett-Packard 
Bus 001 Device 001: ID 0000:0000

As always when you try to get help, their forum is offline:
http://club.aopen.com.tw/forum/

In ubuntu 6.10 I was also able to configure the IR module using Lirc
and mceusb2, but in 7.04 (which I'm using) I cannot compile Lirc nor is the mceusb2 driver included, even though the version of Lirc is correct.

Anyway I'm mostly interested in the LCD, how to get it working.

Oh and for more information about my front-end, check out my bookmarks on the subject: http://del.icio.us/delegatevoid/mythtv

[El_Matthews]

Hello,

Great guide, just what I was lookinf for except that my case is an origenae X10 but the VFD is the same.

Everything works except the remote. when I start the with

irserver -codedump -loglevel 4 /dev/ttyUSB0

the serial number of the VFD appears etc. but when I press a command on my remote nothing appears. The time appears correctly on my VFD so communication to the VFD works correctly.

Any idea where or what I have to look for?

[jpgscca]

Hi,

New to the Ubuntu Forums but here goes...

I'm having the same problem. Mythtv is setup and running but the remote doesn't work. I was able to see the commands by using the "-debug_code" command option to see the commands from the remote.
try this:

irserver -codedump -debug_code -loglevel 4 /dev/ttyUSB0

Hope this helps.
Still not sure why I can't use the remote.

[falela]

sorry for the late reply.
Did you apt-get mythtv or compile from source. apt-get should include lircd support. And remember to copy the renamed lircrc to ~/.mythtv/ directory.
and finally, what did it say when you ps -e. If you follow the steps, it should show irserver, LCDd and mythlcdserver

cheers

[timothyp]

I got lirc-modules or so using apt, compiled the mceusb2 driver
and the missing step was to copy that file to ~/mythtv/...

Done that now and everything is working

(With the exception of the VFD but there seems to be an update lcdproc which I will give a try

[El_Matthews]

everything worked correctly until I updated my system this friday.

Now I have no remote control anymore. even

irserver -codedump -debug_code -loglevel 4 /dev/ttyUSB0

gives all the info of the

IRTRans Send Done: 1
Name   : 
Version: D5.03.08
FW SNo : 20897
Capab  : Power On; 
FW Cap : 3964953
USB SNo: 
Node   : /dev/ttyUSB0

IRServer Version 5.8.04

but when I press a button on my remote nothing appears. Anybody the same problem?

PS: I already re-downloaded the src files and recompiled the irserver but same problem. Please help because a mythbox without remote isn't very ussefull.

[El_Matthews]

I don't know how but it works again so you can ignore my question

[davidgardner]

Just wanted to mention, that I couldn't find out how to get LCDd working until I found this post, and I'm not even running Ubunto. The in order to get the LCDd script working for Gentoo I commented out the LSB function include on line 40, and replaced the log_* functions with a call to logger. Hope this will help non-Ubuntu users who stumble upon this post.

[BatPenguin]

Hello everybody,

Great to see a how-to for this case, I'm considering upgrading my system and using this one. Could you answer a very newbie-ish question about the LCD for me, though: what information does it show / what can you set it up to show there? For example: can you show something like "upcoming recordings" etc?

I've been using Mythtv for a year or so now, but I've never had (or seen) a system setup with one of these screens, so I'd be interested to know what it is that you can see from it and how useful you think it is.

Around next month I'll be upgrading pretty much everything in my system (currently Athlong XP 2800, looking at quad cores now) and I'd very much appreciate comments on this case. Also: can you disable the volume knob controls without it affecting the screen? I have a 2-year old daughter who enjoys touching all sorts of volume controls and such... Thanks!