RF4CE Consortium aims to develop RF standard for entertainment control

Whittling down the amount of remotes in one's living room has long since been a challenge for the amateur home theater builder, and while there are some decent universal solutions on the market, the RF4CE Consortium is hoping to make things painfully simple. The group has been formed in order to "drive the adoption of an open radio frequency (RF) entertainment control specification based on IEEE 802.15.4." If you'll recall, this isn't the first time we've heard that standard called, as it's also used in MaxStream's XBee Xtender. Notably, Freescale is hoping to incorporate its Synkro technology into the specification, and in an ideal world, we'd see said protocol filter into DVD players, AV receivers, set-top-boxes and all manners of components. Let the IR-to-RF transition begin, we say.

Read - Sony's RF4CE Consortium release
Read - Freescale's RF4CE Consortium release

[Verbal_Kint @ Jun 13th 2008 7:56AM]

Why not use bluetooth? Pair your phone/remote with your TV, and no-one will be able to switch your channel. When you lose/replace it: pair your new device. Adaptable, future-proof, and hardly any development costs. Oh, and cheap..

[Flashpoint @ Jun 13th 2008 8:09AM]

You beat me to it.

Bluetooth would be the best possibility but then, you'd need a remote that had some type of flash memory that could be updated with new Bluetooth profiles to accomidate new devices.

Manufacturers adding these techniques and devices would also demand more for their products.

I doubt most manufacturers would do this because theey really want you to lose/break your remote and then have to order another.

[Ian @ Jun 13th 2008 1:24PM]

the only problem with that is that it doesn't always work. I know i have had problems with blue tooth not working with phones, although i admit that may be because the phone companies disabled some of the bluetooth functions.

[chickenator @ Jun 13th 2008 8:37AM]

"...we'd see said protocol filter into DVD players, AV receivers, set-top-boxes and all manners of components..."

yeah, deee-veee-deee player.

[rektide @ Jun 13th 2008 1:12PM]

802.15.4 is also the basis for another wireless automation standard: Zigbee. Many of the XBee products work with Zigbee. I'm not sure why you would opt to call out some random companies proprietary extension to 802.15.4, when you could have called out the controlling consortium's proprietary spec random company implements.

[Peter F @ Jun 17th 2008 9:29AM]

Either way, I'm happy. This is long over due. The fact that a someone walking in front of me, or a piece of paper could block my remote, is bad by today's standards. RF FTW