A Finished Look For Home Theater: Cmple’s Compact Infrared Repeater Kit
A new home theater or audio/video installation always looks gorgeous until it’s time to make sure everything works properly. That’s when components often end up being shuffled around with extra cables added to the mix. Before you know it, the pristine look of your theater becomes unexpectedly cluttered and messy.
The primary culprit is usually a remote control.
After all, the optimal design of a beautiful home theater hides most of the equipment in closets or cabinets. But remote controls use infrared light to communicate with components, and infrared signals can’t pass through doors and walls.
That leaves two alternatives: putting all of your equipment out in the open where it will destroy the clean look of your theater – or using an inexpensive IR repeater like Cmple’s Compact Premium Infrared Repeater Kit System.
How The IR Kit Works
To the naked eye, this Cmple kit only looks like a small box, and most people won’t even notice it. There’s a lot more going on, however.
The box is called an IR receiver. It is backed with double-sided tape so it mounts easily to a cabinet, HDTV or wall near the hidden equipment you want to control. There’s just one cable attached to the receiver, which you run into the closet or cabinet where your equipment is hidden. Once the system is installed, you simply point your remote(s) at the IR receiver in order to control a component, and the box takes it from there (as long as you have line-of-sight from your viewing position to the receiver).
The IR signals sent to the receiver still can’t be sent through doors or walls, but electrical signals can, so there’s a little magic involved in the rest of the process. The receiver converts the infrared light to an electrical signal which is sent through the attached cable, to a connecting block inside the cabinet or closet. That connecting block then turns the electric signal back into infrared light that’s transmitted to the A/V equipment by means of small IR emitters. The emitters can be placed directly onto the controlled components’ sensor windows, or used to “flood” an area where there is a lot of equipment.
It’s an elegant solution that lets you control your entire system from the comfort of your couch or chair – while letting you keep all of the components hidden.
Cmple’s Compact Infrared Premium Infrared Repeater Kit
Technophiles with tons of equipment may need something more full-featured, but the Cmple Compact IR Repeater is designed for a “normal” home theater or audio/video system. The connecting block has two emitter jacks, but by using inexpensive emitters with two or three heads apiece, you can control as many as six different components from this one small kit.
The receiver is what’s known as “dual band,” which simply means it can handle all of the frequencies used by every common model of HDTV, Blu-ray and DVD player, and other electronic equipment (and their remotes). The Cmple Compact system can be set up in minutes, you can use your remote control as far as 40 feet away from the receiver, and most visitors won’t even know it’s there. All they’ll see is a clean, modern looking home theater in which everything works perfectly.
