Remote control adds so much more convenience! After completing the DSP Musicolour design (as published in the June, July and August issues) we looked at the possibility of adding infrared remote control.

It turned out to be really simple – so here we describe how to build a simple remote control receiver PC board to allow the DSP Musicolour to be operated via a remote control which uses RC5 codes – the vast majority – or a universal remote control. The DSP Musicolour firmware contains the decoding functions.

The schematic for the remote control receiver board is shown overleaf It contains little more than an infrared receiver module that amplifies and demodulates the remote control signal. The signal is then decoded by the firmware.

Apart from the IDC header which connects the Remote Control PC board back to the main board, there are only three other components: a 47mF capacitor to bypass the supply rail (taken from the DSP Musicolour’s 5V rail) and a 100W resistor to limit the current and further isolate the infrared module from the supply rail.

Finally, there is a 330W resistor. As the RF6 pin of the microcontroller (IC1) can function as an output as well as input, this resistor is used on the output of the module to limit the current into the data output of the infrared receiver module.

MUSICOLOUR - THE MOVIE! It’s quite hard to put into words just how sensational the DSP Musicolour lightshow really is . . . so you’ll be able to see it! Around the time this issue appears, we hope to have ready a short demonstration movie which can be accessed via the SILICON CHIP website.

Construction

This is a simple board that should take a matter of minutes to build. Simply refer to the component overlay and the accompanying photograph.