Fluorescent lamp and IR receiver / remote

[firephoto]

Well I've had an intermittent problem with my 301 receiver and the remote not controlling the 301 sometimes. It will always work with the Toshiba tv and the Pioneer receiver.

Well today it happened again, and I knew it was working fine this morning so I started trouble shooting it. I could get really close to the receiver and it would work so I figured the batteries might be low. Nope, tested good. So I thought maybe the IR emitter came loose from the circuit board since it sticks out of the front of the remote a little. Took the remote apart, all looked fine, put it back together. Next I took a close look at the receiver made sure the little tube looking windows for the sensors might be dirty, polished them a little with my shirt, noticed the light from a fluorescent lamp was reflecting off the clear lens so I turned off the fluorescent lamp and the remote started working fine.

What I found was that if the bare fluorescent lamp bulb (one of those swirly ones) was in line of sight of the ir sensor on the 301 that the remote wouldn't work till I got close. Well it wasn't the fact that I was getting close, it was because I was blocking the light! :eek:

It an Ott-Lite 13w VisionSaver Captiva Desk lamp.
http://amazon-product.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/B00005QI52

Is this common for most fluorescent lights?

It was starting to get sort of irritating. ;)

[Chris Blount]

Yes. I have floourescent bulbs (the curly ones) in an overhead light in a bedroom and sometimes when I turn on the light, it will turn on the TV. Really weird.

[Sandman]

Along the same line I have encountered situations with a rf remote not working in area that have electronic ballast in the fluorescent fixtures

[cab]

In my case the fluorescent bulb really caused problems. I had an energy audit done last year and he replaced an incandesant bulb with the fluorescent one to save electric bill $$. It just so happened that on the same day as the audit, I had been futzing around with my HT and moving things around, changing cables etc.

At night (with the f light on) things didn't work. All my IR remotes seemed like they just up an died at the same time. I thought it was the work I had done on the HT. The next day (no light on) things worked fine again. It took me a couple of days for light to dawn on marblehead (so to speak) that the new bulb might be causing the problem.

[Mike123abc]

I have florescent light bulbs working with IR remotes, but they do not shine right on the equipment (most inset on shelves). Maybe you can change the placement of the light/equipment to eliminate the problem.