Computer: mac mini intel 2009, core 2 duo 2GHz, 4GB RAM, 120GB HDD, NVidia 9400m using 256MB of RAM

Eyetv diversity

Leopard 10.5.6

Software:

EyeTV - v3.1.1

Plex - v0.7.15

Perian.Prefpane

That's about it. Nothing else installed on the computer.

I have two apple remotes and both were working fine.

I could launch the RM menu, activate the behaviours for both Plex and EyeTV. This all worked as advertised.

I had the mac upgraded from 1gb to 4GB of RAM.

So, I tun the mac on for the first time following the upgrade and discover that neither of the remotes work.

There is no response from the mac with remote buddy either on or off

I spent about an hour on the phone with apple care. My initial assumption being that some IR cable wasn't reconnected to the casing when the mac was reassembled during the upgrade. We tried resetting the PRAM, resetting whatever it's called when you completely turn off and disconnect the mac from the mains? other standard IR stuff in security preference pane.

Finally he got me to hold down the Menu button on the remote while starting up the Mac. This should result in the Mac entering the Startup Manager. Nothing. Non of this had any effect. We then agreed that it was most likely as I had suggested a hardware fault, probably caused during reassembly.

As it turned out, utter nonsense!

This morning I was set to head back down to the mac store and get this addressed by a 'genius' when i noticed in the list of hardware that I not only had a Built in IR Receiver (enabled, green light but not responding) but also a second IR receiver which was labelled as an EyeTV receiver (also an apple remote) this was disabled.

I activated this second IR reciever. RB complained that this may cause a conflict with the other IR receiver. But I enabled it anyway.

Having done this the Remote buddy began to work again. It worked with both apple remotes. I could activate Plex and control is fully. However, when I switch EyeTV (using RB) the remotes are again ignored.

I've tried to uninstall RB deleted plist files etc.

I've also used the RB setup utility to remove and install the driver.

I've really no idea where it's gotten screwed up. If anyone has an idea what's happening I'd love to hear from you.

I'm really trying to avoid system rebuild but running out of ideas

I've placed the log file here in case anyone would care to take a look:

http://idisk.mac.com/russellgrocott//Public/Console%20Messages.log

Cheers Russell

From what you tell me this sounds like a hardware defect or that no 
IR light reaches the built-in sensor anymore. Why?

1) The only thing that happened between working state and non-working 
state was the hardware disassembly / assembly. The software didn't 
change and it worked before. Result: this is a hardware problem.

2) You can't bring up the boot menu with the Apple Remote. This 
feature is implemented in the EFI firmware. So this is a feature 
running at a point where OS X hasn't even started running yet. 
Consequently, this feature is completely outside of the sphere of 
influence of any software (including Remote Buddy, which can't cause 
you such a problem anyway). Result: this is a hardware problem.

3) You reset the PRAM, which - with Apple hardware - is sometimes 
necessary to cure a USB problem (the IR receiver is internally 
connected via USB), when OS X no longer sees an actually connected 
device. Result: this is a hardware problem.

4) The Apple IR receiver hardware as such seems to be detected on the 
USB bus as such (you wouldn't see it in Remote Buddy otherwise). Which 
can still mean that a component of the receiver is defective after the 
hardware assembly/disassembly, but at least there's a chance that you 
just didn't put it back into its place correctly and that there's now 
no longer a line of sight between the receiver's IR sensor and the 
"outside world". Result: this is a hardware or physical problem.

5) The EyeTV receiver has nothing to do with the built-in Apple IR 
receiver. The EyeTV receiver is a completely independent IR receiver 
built into your EyeTV-supported hardware, that can *also* be used with 
Remote Buddy. More info on this on the Remote Buddy website point 
"EyeTV remotes". Result: the EyeTV receiver has no relevance to this 
problem.

My resumée:

Your problem IS a hardware (or physical, and thus also hardware) 
problem. It is not a software problem. Remote Buddy has no part in it. 
Nor has OS X. Uninstalling or reinstalling any software - be it Remote 
Buddy or be it OS X itself - will not solve the problem.

Best regards, 
Felix Schwarz 

Can you confirm that you\'re suggesting that the IR port on the EyeTV hardware is capturing these inputs and relaying them to RB? If not it would suggest to me that the IR port on the Mac *is* in this instance receiving messages from the Apple remote.

1) with EyeTV Receiver > Apple Remote disabled (= ignore all input 
from this source): no IR signal is received 
2) with EyeTV Receiver > Apple Remote enabled (= use all input from 
this source): IR signal is received and reacted to

If the signal would have been received by the built-in Apple IR 
receiver, it'd also be received in case 1) and in all the other cases 
that Apple's support has also mentioned (prior to OS X boot, by the 
EFI firmware's boot menu, etc). But it isn't.

Best regards, 
Felix Schwarz 

Hey Ho, it's off to the mac store we go!