turls Posted July 23, 2012 Share Posted July 23, 2012 http://www.d-box.com/en/downloads/home-theatre/The new version of software claims support for "TCP/UDP commands support"There is a manual on the page linked above that gives the serial protocol, which has been available a long time.I cannot find any mention of D-BOX on the Control4 website as far as official driver support.Since this controller cannot be IR controlled very well (new units don't even ship with a remote, and most commands are not available in IR that I know of), it would be nice to integrate this with serial or IP.Even if the driver is not available, is that manual enough for a compentent driver writer to make a driver?The biggest reason to control remotely is the ability to individually adjust the MFX (motion) effects by chair. You could even completely disable I believe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turls Posted July 24, 2012 Author Share Posted July 24, 2012 I contacted DBOX support and they have a short document that explains how to connect to the controller using IP. I hope somebody has either already written a C4 driver or will look at it now that IP is available. But I guess if nobody did anything with RS232 they probably won't get too excited about IP? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bk Posted July 25, 2012 Share Posted July 25, 2012 So I wonder if anyone has integrated D-Box with Control4?I would have thought that in the US it would be not such a unusual request. :| Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turls Posted August 2, 2012 Author Share Posted August 2, 2012 Ok so serial control has been out a while and now we have IP and no one has written a driver for this? I find this hard to believe. Everything is documented and it has been done on other systems like Crestron. Seems like it would be a certified driver. Its a bullet point C4 would be losing points on in very expensive installs! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bk Posted August 16, 2013 Share Posted August 16, 2013 Is anyone here interested in writing a simple driver for this? The protocol document is foreign to me.Even as basic as on/off?http://www.d-box.com/media/docs/Downloads/Production/Files_914-0042-C_EN.pdf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
THEORY Posted August 17, 2013 Share Posted August 17, 2013 We offered to create a driver for D-Box as I have the seating myself. They wanted it for free so nothing happened. They charge a heck of a lot for the product you'd think they would pay for a driver.Was told they never paid for the others so they will not pay for a C4 driver. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bk Posted August 17, 2013 Share Posted August 17, 2013 Do you by any chance have a simple driver you would like to share?As I mentioned, on \ off would do me.We offered to create a driver for D-Box as I have the seating myself. They wanted it for free so nothing happened. They charge a heck of a lot for the product you'd think they would pay for a driver.Was told they never paid for the others so they will not pay for a C4 driver. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turls Posted August 17, 2013 Author Share Posted August 17, 2013 We offered to create a driver for D-Box as I have the seating myself. They wanted it for free so nothing happened. They charge a heck of a lot for the product you'd think they would pay for a driver.Was told they never paid for the others so they will not pay for a C4 driver.Who is "they"? D-BOX? What about splitting the cost among users? Do companies normally pay for drivers to be written?I would like to see this happen and would help fund development. That being said, I'm not about to take it on as a one-off custom project.EDIT: of course, I'm only interested in IP driver. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
THEORY Posted August 18, 2013 Share Posted August 18, 2013 I haven't bothered with even anything basic.Yes the "they" is D-Box. Some companies do pay, some don't. We could look at building a driver funded by users. Last time we tried to do that a few other dealers got upset as a gather they feel it devalues their development efforts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turls Posted August 18, 2013 Author Share Posted August 18, 2013 I would think this would be an exception because it is such a niche product. I don't think it is on anybody's radar. What other product has been out for so many years with basically no changes (an no likely changes any time soon), has offered serial control for this long, is an obvious home automation candidate, and has been ignored? It kind of baffles me. Maybe most people with D-BOX have Crestron or AMX?There is an "active" thread on AVS Forums ("active" being relative in this case). I pointed them to this thread again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turls Posted August 18, 2013 Author Share Posted August 18, 2013 Does having the iRule driver available help anybody?http://www.d-box.com/en/consumer/support_downloadMy original link is dead, they changed the website. They still haven't posted the IP control document but it is available.EDIT: the more I think about this, the more it seems ridiculous. iRule is nowhere near the system that C4 is, and they have D-BOX covered. Crestron does. Why is C4 falling through the cracks? Somebody with an iRule system must have funded this development, since D-BOX doesn't pay for drivers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bk Posted August 19, 2013 Share Posted August 19, 2013 I would be happy to help fund a basic driver, I am guessing that a one way driver works driver would take someone with the appropriate knowledge an hour to create a basic driver to turn the system on / off.This base would help for a remote located D-Box head to be activated based on the cinema use. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bk Posted August 30, 2013 Share Posted August 30, 2013 anyone? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
THEORY Posted August 31, 2013 Share Posted August 31, 2013 Again we may look at it in the near future but at the moment I'm not in any real need. I have a couple systems that could use this, but D-Box themselves aren't very concerned. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turls Posted February 14, 2014 Author Share Posted February 14, 2014 Ok, I'm bringing this up again. I just got my last set of used actuators and I'm all in for this on 5 seating positions. My guess is not everybody watching the movies will want it enabled, and if they do they might want to be able to adjust the effect level. THEORY, its go time. If I don't see a response here I may try PM'ing you. What is the level of complexity of this since everything is completely documented? Any C4 IP programmers, please look at the documentation I've attached and throw me a price. If its within reason, I don't care if I fund initial development, help with testing, and then you could go sell it elsewhere.D-Box Ethernet remote control.pdfD-Box Rs-232 Protocol SeriesIV.pdfD-BOX RS-232 Remote Control Detailed Description and Usage Files_914-0042-C_EN.pdf Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bk Posted February 20, 2014 Share Posted February 20, 2014 I am still interested also, I am just interested in basic control Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turls Posted February 20, 2014 Author Share Posted February 20, 2014 We need a way to offer a bounty for this...I'm sure there are websites that offer it for regular programming. Not exactly the Kickstarter model, but similar. Seriously, how complicated can it be when there is this much documentation? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turls Posted February 24, 2014 Author Share Posted February 24, 2014 I am still interested also, I am just interested in basic control What do you mean by basic control? There are only a few options. You want to be able to power up or power down individual chairs right? There are only about two other adjustable options besides that.If all you want to do is power up/down the complete system I'm not sure what that gets you. Mine is powered on all the time and if there aren't codes that activate it I don't even know its on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bk Posted February 25, 2014 Share Posted February 25, 2014 Unfortunately if I leave mine powered it tends to lock up requiring a reboot. As it is in a server room it would make it so much easier if it was integrated.regardless im still interested in a driver for it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turls Posted February 25, 2014 Author Share Posted February 25, 2014 Interesting...what controller do you have? I have the Series IV and it is very solid I don't know if I've ever had to power cycle from a lockup in almost 2 years. If it is locked up a power off command may not work anyway. You may end up needing an IP controlled power source of some sort to do an actual power cycle. Do you have clean power going to it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turls Posted August 22, 2014 Author Share Posted August 22, 2014 Not sure why I didn't think of this before, but as basic as the most important commands are, I think maybe Chowmain's Generic TCP Command driver might work. Anybody already have it and D-BOX to try? Also, word in there is a new controller coming out at CEDIA that will detect movies the same way apps like Shazam do. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alanchow Posted August 22, 2014 Share Posted August 22, 2014 Not sure why I didn't think of this before, but as basic as the most important commands are, I think maybe Chowmain's Generic TCP Command driver might work. Anybody already have it and D-BOX to try? Also, word in there is a new controller coming out at CEDIA that will detect movies the same way apps like Shazam do. I recommend that you utilise a trial licence to test this out prior to purchase. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
turls Posted August 22, 2014 Author Share Posted August 22, 2014 Very good advice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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