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I wrote a post a little while ago about How-to use the HD-PVR with Windows Media Center. A lot of people, including me, have experienced slow channel changes with the internal HD-PVR IR blaster. One of the options with the native Hauppauge drivers is to use an external IR blaster. We’ve been using the IR Server Suite which is very powerful but the documentation is a little thin. Especially since it was designed initially for other software. Below are the steps I went through to get it set up on my system. Hopefully it will help others.

Before you get started, If you also have a Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-1850 or WinTV-HVR-2250 installed, use the Hauppauge Windows Media Center remote control receiver/blaster configuration utility (Hcwcirconfig_tool_1.2.28165.exe) to enable or disable the built-in IR receiver/blaster hardware. Download it from the Hauppauge Support site (Accessories tab).

How to set up the IR Server Suite

• Download IR Server Suite – Test Build 1.4.2.3281.zip
• Run setup
• Under tools, leave everything selected and ALSO check IR File Tool and CommandLine Tools
• Click Next
• Leave IR Server as Service selected
• Click Next
• Click Install
• Leave ‘Run IR Server Configuration’ checked and click Finish
• Deselect everything except Microsoft MCE (you should see both boxes checked next to the Configure button)
• Click the Configure button next Microsoft MCE
• On the Basic tab, deselect ‘Disable Windows Media Center services’
• Click OK to close the config dialog
• Click OK
• Click OK to restart the IR Server
• Go to C:\ProgramData\IR Server Suite
• Look in the Set Top Boxes folder and see if one of the boxes is the one you have.
• If there is one, open its folder and copy all the *.ir files to C:\ProgramData\IR Server Suite\IR Commands
• Then right-click on the IR Server icon in your task tray and click Configuration
• Then click OK and OK again to restart the IR Server
• If your Set Top Box is not one of the ones listed, you’ll need to have Server Suite Learn the commands
• Click the Windows Start orb and go to IR Server Suite
• Find the IR File tool and click it to run
• Under Server at the top, click Connect
• You should then be connected to the server
• Get your Set Top Remote and get it positioned near (maybe an inch or 2 away) and pointed at your IR receiver device
• Click File – New
• Click Learn IR and press the button on your remote (start with the 1 button). Press the button but don’t hold it down.
• You’ll see a bunch of numbers and at the bottom ‘Learned IR Successfully’. If you don’t get it right away, try holding your remote a little closer or a little further away.
• Then click File – Save As and save it to C:\ProgramData\IR Server Suite\IR Commands as the key.IR. So, if you just programmed the 1 key it would be 1.IR
• Continue with the steps above for all the numbers 0 to 9 and the Select button (label it SEL.IR) I created one called E.IR that is just a duplicate of SEL.IR.
• Close the IR File Tool
• Then right-click on the IR Server icon in your task tray and click Configuration
• Then click OK and OK again to restart the IR Server

Next, you have to go into your Registry and enable the HD-PVR drivers to use your new IR Server Suite. Be careful editing your registry as you could screw up your computer.

• Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\PSWTuner\HCW49SWT\Blaster
• Set “ActiveBlaster”=dword:00000002
• Set “ExtAppName” to the path C:\Program Files\IR Server Suite\IRBlast-NoWindow.exe
• Set “ExtAppArgs” to -host localhost -delay 250 -channel %c “E.IR”

If you are interested, Wolfe explains more about these external arguments in his post on The Green Button.

Here is an export from my registry:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\PSWTuner\HCW49SWT\Blaster]
“ActiveBlaster”=dword:00000002
“ExtAppArgs”=”-host localhost -delay 250 -channel %c \”E.IR\”"
“ExtAppName”=”C:\\Program Files\\IR Server Suite\\IRBlast-NoWindow.exe”

Hopefully these instructions will be helpful to you.  Now, go enjoy some HD.

UPDATE: 06JUNE2012: Here is a screen shot of the new settings for use with the latest HD-PVR software.

App Path is:
C:\Program Files\IR Server Suite\IRBlast-NoWindow.exe

App args is:
-host localhost -delay 250 -channel %c “E.IR”
or try this one:
-host localhost -pad 3 -channel %c “E.IR”