Infrared Remote Control Support

I’ve been trying to use the Apple IR Remote to control the Roon application on my Mac, it doesn’t seem to work at all.

Roon’s Remote app for the iPad works great - but sometimes I just want to use the small/IR remote for very simple transport controls.

Should this work? Am I missing something?

It works on my Mac (iMac). I didn’t have to ‘do’ anything, the transport commands were simply passed through.

Rik

Thanks for the comment, it’s helpful to know that it should work.

Apple IR-remote doesn’t do that for me on the Mac, instead:
a) If I’m running nothing (on the desktop): the IR-volume controls the system volume and IR-play/pause launches iTunes.
b) If I’m running the VLC player (video player): VLC intercepts all the remote commands and the IR-remote controls playback, volume, etc (as expected/desired)
c) If I’m running Roon: it doesn’t intercept the remote commands at all; instead, iTunes is launched, as in (a).

If it weren’t for case (b) “it works with the VLC Player”, I’d suspect some preference setting re: the remote controlling iTunes preemptively - but since VLC works, I was hoping for the same with Roon…

If anyone has any suggestions on something I need to set to make this work properly on my Mac, I’d really appreciate it … thanks in advance.

PS. I should mention, the IR remote doesn’t work with Amarra either. But that used to require a special mini-app, I don’t know if Amarra still needs that.

I used to have VOX installed - which had a pass through app for IR & media buttons (On the keyboard) - could it be that?

Rik

I just began working on a Roon behavior for RemoteBuddy. RemoteBuddy is a great app for controlling just about anything with any remote on OS X.

I’ve never done this before, so I have no idea how hard it is. Feel free to give it a try yourselves :grin: But getting a Roon behavior working would allow for excellent and entirely customizeable control. If a button doesn’t do what you want, just change it. I’ll update if I get it working properly.

Anyone running a Mac as a media center ought to get RemoteBuddy.

Here’s a finished Roon behavior (plugin) for Remote Buddy if you want to try it out. It’s very simple, but works well enough with basic transport controls. Selecting it makes Roon the active app and restricts remote control to Roon only. It looks really nice if Roon is in fullscreen mode and just slides in from the side when the behavior is selected, and restricting controls to one app prevents unexpected behavior like launching iTunes or playing a track in Spotify while trying to control Roon.

What we really need is for Roon to incorporate more keyboard shortcuts and a better Apple remote behavior, so one could easily implement them in Remote Buddy. As is, there’s very little to do beside skip tracks and play/pause. But the above behavior is a big improvement for anyone using a remote control nonetheless.

That’s true…
If there were more keyboard shortcuts, you could also easily integrate EventGhost on the Windows side

@Brian_Murphy
Sorry Brian, yours is the only @ that I know off by heart!
Could you weigh in here when you get a chance please? I’m sure the preferred remote method for most users will be a Roon remote on a handheld device etc. however sometimes that is out of reach or not practical while a programmable remote is almost always at hand.
IR would be nice at the very least however you’d then need to develop and support for all platforms and their capabilities. IP control would be really great and is supported by Harmony’s top units (which I own) and the upcoming Neeo which I will own if it ever ships! I’m sure other programmable remotes also support IP control too.

Check out this latest feature update from Neeo that adds Apple Music and Spotify player sync and control.
Am I alone in thinking Roon running on this form factor would be fantastic? Saves me having to pull out a phone or tablet while listening with company, something that can kill the mood!

https://neeo.com/blog/2016/7/27/apple-music-spotify

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I like what they’re doing with the remote hardware. Hopefully they can deliver. Are they showing the Neeo app controlling Sonos? I’m assuming they’re leveraging the Sonos platform rather than doing a direct integration with Apple Music and Spotify.

More integration been shown, this time Plex on Neeo.

Any news on Apple IR remote support for volume control when running Roon headless on a Mac Mini? Still does not seem to work. Would be great as I use my DAC as pre-amp as well and it has no remote (Chord Hugo).

Yes I’m wondering this too. How to control Roon server with an ir remote (on Windows in my case).
I know from an old post that this has been asked before: Remote control of play/pause skip/rewind via USB DAC
Is there any progress with this?

In my current setup I can control Roon if I run a Roon Remote on the same machine as the Roon server. But Roon Remote has to be in focus and other programs on the machine seems to hijack ir commands from time to time.

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You could use something like this:

http://www.riitek.com/product/x1.html

Cheap too.

Yes, that would be an excellent solution. I would hope that the Neeo could send transport control to Roon Server on my Mac mini and volume and input selection to my Hegel H360 USB DAC integrated amp. The Hegel IR remote has computer transport controls that work with iTunes but does not control Roon Core or Roon Server.

I have a Rii keyboard, but don’t see how that solves my issue of controlling a headless Mac Mini.

New link to RemoteBuddy plugin

http://gofile.me/3kr0w/Gpi49N8Kd

NEEO finally announced that they start shipping today. I put in a feature request for Roon Remote integration on their new Planet NEEO forum.

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Also backed NEEO and finally receive my EU version.
Great look and feel and would indeed love Roon integration.
If only to send a stop command so when shutting down my kit Roon also stops.

For me, a simpler solution than RemoteBuddy is BetterTouchTool. As combined keystrokes are not selectable in the Harmony remapping app, I first remapped Roon’s commands for next and previous track to F10 and F11 with BTT. Then I mapped the Harmony next/previous keys to F10 and F11 with the MacMini (with my Roon core) as a media device in the Harmony app. Start and pause can be mapped directly without using BTT. The BTT remapping can be forced to act app-specific, so F10 and F11 are only changed for Roon.