I've looked all over the place for the Panasonic IR format, but the only information I've found is that it is 48 bit long. That much I can figure my self by looking at the Pronto and Neo codes. It is 50 pairs long. I would assume 1 lead in and one lead out, and 48 pairs encoding binary command.

I was looking for the Panasonic VCR discrete code and the only one that worked does reset my programming. If I know the panasonic IR format and try all of the commands and see if one of them does discrete on or off.

The first 3 bytes look the same for all the panasonic IR commands, the next 3 bytes varry. Also it would help to know which IR code pair encodes 0 and which encodes 1.

Panasonic uses their interpretation of the Kaseikyo IR standard.

It is documented in my IRP notation in its entry within my DecodeIR documentation at
[Link: john.fine.home.comcast.net]

I don't expect you know IRP notation, but it isn't too hard and you'll probably find it worth learning if you want to examine IR signals. If you know any other protocols, you may find them in that same document and compare your understanding of the structure to the IRP documented for them.

Remember all times and frequencies are approximate. The IRP description of Panasonic is
{37k,432}<1,-1|1,-3>(8,-4,2:8,32:8,D:8,S:8,F:8,(D^S^F):8,1,-173)+

meaning:
it is approximately 37Khz modulation,
each unit of time is approximately 432 microseconds,
a '0' bit is one unit ON and one unit OFF,
a '1' bit is one unit ON and three units OFF,
The lead-in is 8 unit ON and 4 units OFF,
The first two (8-bit) bytes are always 2 and 32 (These identify Panasonic within the Kasiekyo standard).
Software by various people who reverse engineered the protocol and recreate it, identify the next two bytes as Device and Subdevice. That is not technically correct. Those 16 bits are really 4 independent 4-bit fields. But treating them as Device and Subdevice makes it easier to fit in general software packages and isn't inconsistent with the values Panasonic uses.
The second to last byte is the function and the last byte is and xor of the three bytes before it.

This message was edited by johnsfine on 07/11/05 20:43 ET.

Cool.

I think it is all I need. Thanx a lot.

I know almost nothing about IR, but I can make sense out of bits and nibles:-)

Btw, I didn't see on your page is there any describtion of th IRP notation? Just for the future references. As far as my current task I think you gave me enough help.

0_________ 1_________  2________ 3_________ 4_________ 5
0123456789 0123456789 0123456789 0123456789 0123456789 0123456789
0000000010 0000100000 Dev_______ Sub Dev___  Fun______  XOR( B2, b3, b4)

I forgot to mention that the bits are transmitted in LSB sequence within each byte. For example 2 is transmitted as 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0.

Also, why does your picture above show ten bits in each byte? There are only eight bits in each.

because I am dumb. I was doing something else when I've read your reply and had to leave quickly. In the rush I typed 10 digits and copied them everywere. I should have numbered them most significant bit first too.

0_______ 1_______  2______ 3_______ 4_______ 5
76543210 76543210 76543210 76543210 76543210 76543210
00000010 00100000 Dev____ Sub Dev  Fun____  XOR( B2, b3, b4)

I hope I didn't screw up anything else. This so cool. No I can make sense out of my pronto codes for panasonic.

01000000 00000100 ...... :-)

I know very little about IR commands. Does each device uses unique Dev/Sub dev? Or can it interpret several Dev/Sub Dev function tables?

From brief look over some codes I have handy it looks like both learned and some codes I got from this forum use SubDev = all 0.

My learned code had device: 10010000 = 0x90 = 144

Can I find somewhere tables of the functions for a certain Dev/Sub Dev? Do all panasonic devices use the same fun set?

In a worst case I'll try 255 commands and see if one of them is discrete power on or off. As long as there are no deadly functions that will break my vcr I should be fine.

Each device uses a unique device number, but the subdevice varies. The Panasonic VCRs use mainly subdevice 0, but also uses subdevices 1 and 5 and maybe others.

Each of those has 256 possible commands. Searching all 768 would take a long time (my MakeHex program together with IrPanels.exe makes that easier. But it's still quite a lot of effort).

Lots of people have looked for Panasonic discretes, so I think you can find them more easily in the discrete forum rather than searching by yourself.

So far, I've found 3 discrete codes for the Panasonic. 2 on and 1 off. One of them worked but reset programming. That what some people using that code reported.

Frankly, I wasn't expecting my VCR even to support any discrets. I have an old PV-7400. I was quite surprised that one on worked, event with that side effect.

In the process I've got interested in the IR commands themselves. I decided to dig a little bit futher to get some understanding of the command structure. I am not sure if I would ever resort to the brute force method of looking for the codes. But I wanted to see if I can modify discretes that I've got so far, maybe they will work.

I have enough information to make up codes myself and to modify existing commands. I'll take a look at the programs that you mentioned. I wrote a small program to convert NEo codes into Pronto codes and into command bits. Now I can modify the program to use panasonic format.

The only thing I can wish for is a table of known Functions for the Panasonic devices. Again, thanx for your help. You gave me the most important link that I was missing.