Infrared

Infrared is not a smart home protocol so much as the signalling every handheld remote has used for decades. A remote flashes a modulated light pattern, typically around 38 kHz, and the equipment in front of it decodes that pattern as a command. Home Assistant joins in through an IR gateway: a networked box with emitters taped over the equipment’s IR receivers, which converts a command sent over TCP into the same flashes the original remote produced.

Strengths

• Universal reach. Projectors, AV receivers, matrix switchers, TVs, and mini-split air conditioners nearly all accept IR, including equipment far older than any smart home platform and equipment whose manufacturer never shipped an API.
• Fully local. A gateway such as a Global Caché iTach takes commands over the LAN with no cloud in the path, so control survives an internet outage.
• No modification to the equipment. An emitter is adhesive tape over an existing sensor window. Nothing is opened, rewired, or firmware-flashed, which matters on warrantied or leased AV gear.

Trade-offs

• One-way, so no state. IR carries commands outward and returns nothing. Home Assistant cannot tell whether the projector actually powered on, which is why IR integrations are marked assumed-state. Pair an IR gateway with a power sensor or an HDMI signal sensor when a scene depends on knowing the real state.
• Toggle commands drift. Much older equipment exposes only a single power toggle rather than discrete on and off codes, so one missed command leaves the room inverted for the rest of the evening. Discrete codes, where the manufacturer publishes them, are always worth hunting for.
• Line of sight. Emitters must sit on the equipment’s sensor window, and a blaster covering a whole cabinet will also hit every other device in it. Closed cabinet doors and reflective glass both cause intermittent failures that look like network problems.
• Codes have to be sourced. Home Assistant’s iTach integration expects Pronto hex, which comes from the gateway’s IR learner or from a code database rather than from the integration itself.

Infrared in Home Assistant

Home Assistant reaches IR through the gateway, not the equipment. The iTach integration covers Global Caché iTach and GC-100 hardware as a YAML remote platform, and Broadlink covers the RM series. Both send a stored code to a named device and neither reports back. In a Selora install, IR is the fallback for equipment with no network control: where a receiver or display offers IP or serial control with feedback, that path is preferred, and IR fills the gap for everything else in the rack.