OyRemote Manual

(download latest version here)

OyRemote has grown quite a bit from where I started. While it originally was more of a proof of concept, it has become quite a feature rich application to control many aspects of your Onkyo Receiver through the network. The application is absolutely free for personal use! However, developing and maintaining it takes time – if you like it, it would be much appreciated if you could donate a few coins to keep the old motivation up! Donate through PayPal:

This manual is based on version 0.14 of OyRemote.

OyRemote is a utility to communicate from your desktop with your network capable Onkyo AV Receiver. It was tested on a TX-NR1007 using the ISCP protocol version 1.15. Not all receiver models support all commands, so please keep that in mind when testing. Also, (even though I don’t expect any trouble, but Onkyo does the same…) please note that you are sending low level commands to your hardware and this may potentially cause harm or may even break it. Be warned and know that I won’t be hold responsible for anything you do with OyRemote or OyRemoteCL. (For example, it is probably not helping the life expectancy of your relays if you program you receiver to jump between inputs every half a second for the next two weeks….)

With that out of the way, here are the basic functions:

Connection

Insert the IP of your receiver (this will either have been configured on your receiver itself or through DHCP by your router) and Port number here. Then click Connect to establish a connection to your receiver. This will enable the buttons and controls. Check the Autoconnect box to let OyRemote automatically connect the next time you start it. It will use whatever IP and Port was in these fields last. If the connection fails (after a timeout of a few seconds) please doublecheck the IP and Port. Try clicking on the “Amplifier IP” link and see if it opens the Receiver’s interface in your browser. If not, there may be a problem with your network connection or the IP is simply wrong.

Input Select

Select the Audio Input that should be sent to your speakers. Some Inputs offer special features, like the FM input which will let you select a radio station preset, the the Internet Radio input which unlocks certain additional controls.

Show/Hide Log

The log is a live stream of all the commands that are being sent from OyRemote to the receiver and that are received from it over the network connection. This can be used to troubleshoot your commands and also to gain additional information. For example, whilst listening to an Internet Radio station, the receiver will constantly send time and track information etc. The log is running from the moment you are starting OyRemote (notice the small window popping up and disappearing when you start OyRemote).

Network Radio Controls

Only available with certain Inputs, like the Internet Radio or Music Server.

Temporary Level Adjust

Lets you raise or lower the level for your subwoofer or center speaker. Note that these changes are only temporary, the next time you start your receiver they are gone.

Volume

Sets the volume. Notice that the volume will not be set in real time while you are dragging the slider, but only once you let it go! So don’t move it too far unless you want to increase you volume by a lot…

Cursor keys

These come in handy when you want to change your receiver setup or want to navigate through playlists or shared network folders. There is a small textbox in the upper left hand corner (between the up and left arrows). Click in it and you are able to use your keyboard cursor keys for navigation, as well as [Return] for the Enter function and [Backspace] for the Return key (yes I know, naming-wise that is backwards, but function-wise it makes sense…)

Batch commands

The six available batch commands are basically like custom buttons, only they can be edited directly in the main window and they offer the “AutoRun” function. This means that this particular command will be run every time you start OyRemote. For example, you could tell it to set the volume to a certain level and select your PC as the input device.
Above the batch commands there is a setting for the Batch Delay. This is the delay in milliseconds that OyRemote will insert between sending commands, to give the receiver time to do whatever it is meant to do. The default value is 500ms (half a second) and usually works fine. Note that this value is used throughout the application, not just for batch commands. Custom Buttons for example will use it too.

Custom Buttons

These buttons are programmable, meaning you can assign your own label and (batch) command to them. By default when you first start the application, these will all be empty. Click on the Lock button to unlock them. They will turn red. Now click on the button you want to assign a command to and the Command Builder will pop up.

(Note that at this time existing commands will not be parsed, so if you make a change you will have to reconstruct the entire command again – this is on the ToDo list)

The left hand pane will show you the command you are building, while the right hand side will show you all available commands (based in ISCP 1.15 protocol). If you are using a Multi-Zone setup you can change the zone in the upper right hand corner. Not all commands are available for every zone.

To add a command to your current command, either doubleclick it or click the arrow-left button in the middle. To remove a command from the left pane, again doubleclick it or use the arrow-right button. To change the order, select the command with a single click and use the Up and Down buttons.

Name contains the name for your command that well become the Label of your Custom Button.

Before assigning a command to a button it may be a good idea to test it, so that’s what the Test button is for. When done, press Assign Command to assign Label and Command to the button. Done.

Avanced Topic: XML Configuration

Starting with version 0.14 OyRemote uses a XML file for its configuration. This is located in the directory OyRemote is started from and will be created the first time you run it. The XML is relatively self-explainatory. You can modify the labels and IDs of every Input button, as well as every batch command and custom button. Please always back up your existing XML file before manually editing it, otherwise you may run into trouble starting OyRemote (which it will not, if the XML file is broken).
If all is lost, just delete the XML file and OyRemote will create a new one with default (mostly blank) values the next time it is run.