Fiire Chief vs Gyration MCE Remote

[Echo5]

    I just purchased the Gyration MCE remote and although it controlls the menus nicely, it does not function like the Fiire Chief when media is playing. I have seen similiar post regarding this and am wondering if anyone has found a solution for this remote or if I am better off purchasing the Fiire Chief. They are both the same price. I only purchased the Gyration remote because I could get it locally. Did Fiire incorporate specific changes to the remote that allow it to work with LMCE?

Thanks
Echo5

[totallymaxed]

    I just purchased the Gyration MCE remote and although it controlls the menus nicely, it does not function like the Fiire Chief when media is playing. I have seen similiar post regarding this and am wondering if anyone has found a solution for this remote or if I am better off purchasing the Fiire Chief. They are both the same price. I only purchased the Gyration remote because I could get it locally. Did Fiire incorporate specific changes to the remote that allow it to work with LMCE?

Thanks
Echo5

Yes they did. The Fiirechief and its dongle have special firmware to support the 'follow me' functionality in particular.

[Echo5]

I understand that the follow me feature is specific to the Fiire Chief, but I think my main question is did they do anything special to get the other buttons to work properly ( play, pause, jog, etc)?

[teedge77]

Could you elaborate on what it is that doesnt work?

[Echo5]

I also can't seem to play/pause the video from the gyro mouse. Nor can I do any of the options listed in the wiki:

"When media is playing, you can use the normal keys on the i/r remote to control the media playback and volume. Or press F6 or the 'media' button on the gyro remote, and then move left and right to adjust playback speed, or move up and down to skip through chapters/tracks/channels/songs depending on the type of media. With the left and right movement you have both absolute and relative. Absolute means keep the button held down while you move left and right. This is quite useful with the gyro remote. Press the left button, and if you move your hand all the way to the left you are at the beginning of your media, all the way to the right and you are at the end. Or, tap and release the button, then when you move left and right you are in relative, or jog shuttle mode. Move slowly to the right for slow motion forward, further to the right for 400x forward, back to the left to rewind, and so on."

Thanks

[totallymaxed]

I also can't seem to play/pause the video from the gyro mouse. Nor can I do any of the options listed in the wiki:

"When media is playing, you can use the normal keys on the i/r remote to control the media playback and volume. Or press F6 or the 'media' button on the gyro remote, and then move left and right to adjust playback speed, or move up and down to skip through chapters/tracks/channels/songs depending on the type of media. With the left and right movement you have both absolute and relative. Absolute means keep the button held down while you move left and right. This is quite useful with the gyro remote. Press the left button, and if you move your hand all the way to the left you are at the beginning of your media, all the way to the right and you are at the end. Or, tap and release the button, then when you move left and right you are in relative, or jog shuttle mode. Move slowly to the right for slow motion forward, further to the right for 400x forward, back to the left to rewind, and so on."

Thanks

The standard Gyration remote is not one of the standard remotes that has a template in lmce. The Gyro mouse functionality will probably work but not the additional remote buttons. You'd have to add a template yourself.

[colinjones]

Can someone please do a review to compare/contrast Gryo, Wiimote and Fiire? I am really keen to get someone's opinion of each on how well they work etc. I would like just to pick one and buy it rather than go through the process that so many others seem to have, of buy 2 or 3 different remotes before finding the one they prefer - is there any consensus on which provides the best control, functions, and most especially which does the "best" motion sensing. The last in particular, how responsive are they to motion detection? Do they "sample" slowly or do they respond nice and quickly to motion?

Also, you say that the Fiire has specific firmware to support the Follow Me function, won't anything that uses Bluetooth do this anyway through the LMCE software because they connect to the closest BT dongle and LMCE does the rest? Is there something I am missing here?

[1audio]

I have no experience with the Wiimote on LMCE or the stock Gyration. When I tried the stock Gyration it didn't work so "forget it". I have used the Fiire remote and it works quite well. It takes a few days to get used to. And its fully implemented, even during boot, which is a good reason to use it.

If you are retro inclined the Microsoft remote plus USBUIRT works quite well, but lacks some of the features of the Fiire.

And a Samsung Q1 with a Windoze orbiter works great (but shuts down too fast on battery).

The mobile phone orbiter is a neat idea however the bluetooth implementation and the constraints of the platform make it slow. The follow-me works best with the Fiire remote. With the Bluetooth it must wait for the bluetooth to register with the new box and that can be slow.

I tried an iPaq and it works well except the device was somewhat flakey with my WiFi and Win CE made sorting it out a real pain.

And there is always a laptop with the Windoze orbiter on it.

The Q1 I prefer but its $800+
The Fiire is $150
I don't use the rest.

[dopey]

I have used the Gryo mouse and it works great, but of course it only has the three buttons plus left and right click. That was all plug and play; I didn't have to do anything to get it to work and it works pretty well.

I don't know about the rest, yet. I've ordered a couple Fiire remotes, but they haven't arrived yet. I also plan on getting my Harmony 890 to work with it (without the gyration of course), but the USBUIRT is also in the mail... actually most of my testing has halted until I get my Fiire equipment... I'll post back once they come in and I get a chance to test them (the Harmony will take some time).

[totallymaxed]

Can someone please do a review to compare/contrast Gryo, Wiimote and Fiire? I am really keen to get someone's opinion of each on how well they work etc. I would like just to pick one and buy it rather than go through the process that so many others seem to have, of buy 2 or 3 different remotes before finding the one they prefer - is there any consensus on which provides the best control, functions, and most especially which does the "best" motion sensing. The last in particular, how responsive are they to motion detection? Do they "sample" slowly or do they respond nice and quickly to motion?

Also, you say that the Fiire has specific firmware to support the Follow Me function, won't anything that uses Bluetooth do this anyway through the LMCE software because they connect to the closest BT dongle and LMCE does the rest? Is there something I am missing here?

Well we have Gyration Mice and we have the Fiire remote... don't have a Wii controller. The Gyration mouse works fine but has too few buttons to make totally usable standalone... ie you still need to use a keyboard to access much of UI2 (UI1 though would be ok). The Fiire remote has been designed specifically to work with UI2 so all of its buttons and features are tightly coupled and work very smoothly. Also it really is 'plug n play' straight out of the box I can confirm... no problems at all and very slick. Then there is follow-me. Now follow me has been part of Pluto (lmce ancestor) since the earliest days and yes it should work with BlueTooth dongles and the PDA or Symbian Orbiter. However in reality due to all BlueTooth dongles we have ever tested over performing in terms of the range there radio enerygy output delivers it is practically useless in any kind of normal sized house. The Orbiter in the PDA/Mobile Phone just cannot figure out which room its in and therefore follow-me can't work!

Hopwever with the Fiire remote follow-me for the first time just works as it should - press the follow-me button on the remote while watching a movie in the 'lounge' and walk to the 'Kitchen' and press follow-me again... and magically that same movie appears at the same time-code on the Orbiter in front of you. That blows people away when you show it too them I can tell you :-)

So from all perspectives I would say your best bet is the Fiire remote (the only negative is its brown plastic case!)

[Echo5]

The standard Gyration remote is not one of the standard remotes that has a template in lmce. The Gyro mouse functionality will probably work but not the additional remote buttons. You'd have to add a template yourself.

Do you know what I would need to do to map the keys on the remote and create a template?

[totallymaxed]

The standard Gyration remote is not one of the standard remotes that has a template in lmce. The Gyro mouse functionality will probably work but not the additional remote buttons. You'd have to add a template yourself.

Do you know what I would need to do to map the keys on the remote and create a template?

You might be in luck... what follows is based on the assumption that 'MCR Remote' is compatible with the remote you have;

Go to Web Admin and Wizard -> Devices -> Media Directors

No find the green 'Add Remote' button for your Core/Hybrid and click it. In the window that appears select 'Gyration' from the Manufacturer pop-up then click 'Apply Filter'. Now select 'MCR Remote' from the Device Template pop-up and the click the green 'Pick Device Template' button and then close the Window. That should have added an 'MCR Remote' to you Hybrid. Your Gyration usb IR receiver should get auto-detected I think.

Now do a reload router and test your remote in the Orbiter... it should be working. If not try rebooting the Core/Hybrid and trying the remote again.

Hope this helps... and saves you the effort  of adding a remote from scratch.

[Echo5]

You might be in luck... what follows is based on the assumption that 'MCR Remote' is compatible with the remote you have;

Go to Web Admin and Wizard -> Devices -> Media Directors

No find the green 'Add Remote' button for your Core/Hybrid and click it. In the window that appears select 'Gyration' from the Manufacturer pop-up then click 'Apply Filter'. Now select 'MCR Remote' from the Device Template pop-up and the click the green 'Pick Device Template' button and then close the Window. That should have added an 'MCR Remote' to you Hybrid. Your Gyration usb IR receiver should get auto-detected I think.

Now do a reload router and test your remote in the Orbiter... it should be working. If not try rebooting the Core/Hybrid and trying the remote again.

Hope this helps... and saves you the effort  of adding a remote from scratch.

That didn't work... I think I may just take it back and order the Fiire Chief... Thanks

[FuZoRBlade]

has anyone created a template that allows the gyration remote to be used just like the FIIRE remote?

I was able to get my gyration remote for 50 dollars cheaper than the FIIRE remote, so it would be great if someone had found a way to get it to work the same way.. minus the follow me feature.

[danielk]

I just wanted to report that I have tried LMCE with the Gyration Remote.

The gyro stuff works out of the box. Only a few keys worked without a custom .Xmodmap. Once the keys were mapped to X11 key events using .Xmodmap, I had to configure individual applications to understand the keys (i.e. using the "Edit keys" MythTV plugin and the KDE setup program.)

Below is my xmodmap, the commented out lines represent keys that I could not get working, the channel up & down keys send events but they are not recognized by the regular HID driver; the driver could be patched for these. Ten keys (power, tv play icon, camera icon, tv icon, music icon, iPod icon, 'setup menu', last, input, and dvd menu) don't send any events, so you probably need the Fiire firmware for these to work. "Follow me" will of course not work with the Gyration remote.

PS you load this using "xmodmap ~/.Xmodmap" where ~/.Xmodmap contains the following:

!XF86PowerDown

keycode 177 = XF86AudioRecord
keycode 164 = XF86AudioStop
keycode 110 = XF86AudioPause
keycode 152 = XF86AudioRewind
keycode 179 = XF86AudioPlay
keycode 180 = XF86Forward
keycode 144 = XF86AudioPrev
keycode 153 = XF86AudioNext

!XF86Launch0
!XF86Launch1
keycode 234 = XF86Back
keycode 134 = XF86Launch2

keycode 176 = XF86AudioRaiseVolume
keycode 174 = XF86AudioLowerVolume
keycode  97 = XF86VendorHome
keycode 160 = XF86AudioMute
!keycode 240 = XF86RockerUp
!keycode 241 = XF86RockerDown

keycode 237 = XF86Launch3
!XF86Launch4
!XF86Launch5
!XF86Launch6

!XF86Clear ; already mapped to escape

!XF86Launch7
!XF86Launch8
!XF86Launch9
!XF86LaunchA