JP1 Remotes

Today I had to swap out an ATSC tuner in my living room, so I had to change my remote setup. No problem, right? Nope. I made the changes and uploaded to the remote, and it's bricked. No LEDs, no response to 981, no communication with IR or jp1xtest. The remote did have the Phantom LED Activation extender loaded.

So I pulled out another unit that I have as a spare. I uploaded an IR file that contains the Phantom LED Activation code and enabled it. Then I uploaded the same IR file from before, and now the remote is stuck in CBL mode. Both volume punch-through and 984 punch-through work correctly with their assigned devices, but the remote's device cannot be changed away from CBL--not even during macros. Neither a battery removal nor a 981 reset changes this behavior. I did try uploading the Phantom LED Activation code and disabling the LEDs, but that did not affect the remote's bad behavior. I notices that mdavej had an inoperable but responsive RCRP05B that was fixed with someone's help; might there be a similar possibility for this one?

I uploaded the IR file that killed two of my remotes to the Diagnosis file section. It has a ton of stuff in it, but it all looks benign to me.

There's a local store that has a few OARP05Ss for sale for $13, so it looks like I'm going shopping tomorrow.

Recap: one RCRP05B bricked, one stuck in CBL mode. Is the latter one recoverable?

my understanding is the battery removal will not unload the extender. Have you tried holding down the setup button for about 5 seconds the cable button will blink 4 times when the extender is disabled. That's all I have for now. Good luck

Yes, I have tried that and many other things. For the bricked one, no LED response--IR or visible. For the other one, nothing gets it out of CBL mode.

Personally, I'm not so sure the LED extender is actually the cause. My understanding is that it simply writes to the operating system portion of the memory once and that's it. Plus, I had been running with the LED extender for a long time before the meltdowns.

Where are you?

If you wouldn't mind sending the remotes to me, I may be able to fix them for you. (and I'll get a chance to see what went wrong and if the extender has anything to do with the weirdness)

PM me and I'll give you the particulars. If they can be fixed I'll send them back when I'm done with them. You should be able to get them into a USPS $4.95 envelope so the shipping won't be horribly expensive.


-bill

PM sent, and location fixed.

I got a new OARP05S going last night (only $12, so I bought some extras, too). I made a new IR file from scratch and it worked fine. I elected not to apply the LED extender this time around.

Stu wasn't using the "extender" but was using a patch that (I think) Vicky did that enabled flashing on the LEDs for the phantom devices.

I was able to fix one of his remotes, the other one is much more dead than I had expected. I'm still thinking about that one.

It's good to know that there's a way to recover when these things happen.

Now that we know that damage can be undone, I wonder if it would be worthwhile to see if the problem is repeatable. Here's what I did, step-by-step.

1. Starting with a brand-new remote (which I have verified to be equivalent to a 981 reset), I uploaded an IR file containing the phantom LED activation protocol. I put the exact IR file in the diag section.

2. After unplugging the JP1 cable, I pressed TV, then CH+ to activate the phantom LEDs.

3. I waited two seconds and plugged the JP1 cable back in. Then I uploaded the IR file I intended to use. Then the remote was stuck in CBL mode.

UPDATE: Bill reports that the memory on the second remote had been overwritten starting at 0x0000. It sounds like it was just a freak occurrence. I applied the LED patch to my replacement OARP05S and everything is fine.