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New Control4 drivers released

MikeKobb

Well-known member
◥ ◣ Kaleidescape, Inc.
Greetings,

We've released updated versions of our Control4 drivers for all Kaleidescape players. These drivers remove the obsolete iPod proxy that was causing the old drivers to stop working on recent versions of Control4's operating system. Note that this means that the "stand-alone touch panel" music browsing functionality has been removed and will not be replaced.

There are some exciting changes in these new drivers!

First, the Alto and Strato drivers now support Control4's device-discovery protocol (SDDP). Composer can discover Alto and Strato players on your network and automatically add the correct driver to your project. When using SDDP, it's not necessary for your player to have a fixed IP address.

Second, all of the drivers in this release support extensive customization of the key mappings. Some keys like the transport control keys and the cursor navigation keys are fixed-function, but other keys that don't have a direct mapping to a Kaleidescape function (like Prev, the channel buttons, the color buttons, and the assignable buttons on the SR-260) can be assigned to functions of your choosing. They even support being mapped to different functions during movie playback and OSD navigation (for example, I have my color buttons mapped to the standard Blu-ray color button functions during media playback, but they jump to specific onscreen display places like covers or collections when playback is not active).

Third, we've made enhancements to the volume control and feedback functionality of these drivers, to support new functionality added in the Kaleidescape Mobile App. In addition to volume up/down commands, the driver now also supports setting a volume level directly using the slider in the app. (Note that using this functionality requires you to set up some additional programming in your Control4 system. See the driver documentation for details.)

All of the drivers are now available within Composer Pro, or you can get them from our website.
 
PS: When you see the drivers in Composer Pro, you may notice that only the Strato and Alto drivers are "Certified". That's because SDDP discovery is a requirement for certification, and our older players don't support SDDP. However, the drivers for the older players are the same full-featured drivers as the Strato and Alto drivers, just minus the discovery aspect.
 
I haven't personally used the Chowmain driver, but I believe the main feature that it offers beyond what's available from our driver is full library navigation on Control4's UIs (e.g. the touch panels, the Neeo remote, etc.). It's similar to the functionality available in our Second Screen application, but incorporated directly into the Control4 interface. It sounds like their driver also supports customized mappings for remote control keys (I don't know how that compares to what we've implemented). I know that their driver supports volume control from our mobile applications, but I don't know if it supports the slider or just the up/down buttons.
 
Second, all of the drivers in this release support extensive customization of the key mappings.
@MikeKobb, is the ability to customize key mappings something that can be done by the end user with Composer HE, or is this something that has to be done by my dealer? Thanks!
 
Third, we've made enhancements to the volume control and feedback functionality of these drivers, to support new functionality added in the Kaleidescape Mobile App. In addition to volume up/down commands, the driver now also supports setting a volume level directly using the slider in the app. (Note that using this functionality requires you to set up some additional programming in your Control4 system. See the driver documentation for details.)
This is the part I'm most looking forward to seeing, as the old version never seemed to work.
 
@MikeKobb, is the ability to customize key mappings something that can be done by the end user with Composer HE, or is this something that has to be done by my dealer? Thanks!
I don't have Composer HE handy (and I'm not Mike) but the key mappings (and volume control and feedback) are done in the Driver Properties section. Here's what it looks like in Composer Pro:
1636640884972.png
So if Composer HE gives you access to the Properties page for your drivers, then you should be able to configure these without requiring programming from your dealer.
 
Had my dealer install the updated driver and I can see the list of properties that @J.Green posted in the screenshot above in my Compose Home Edition. I have one more dumb question... What do the "On-Screen Display Key Bindings" apply to? Does this set what happens when I am at the Control4 OSD screen, or when I am at the Kaleidescape OSD (i.e. not currently playing media)?

Thanks for clarifying!
 
Those are the keys that are used when you are viewing the Kaleidescape onscreen display while not playing media.
 
I like the skip-back 5-seconds function (Do I wish it was customizable? sure, but it's a start,) particularly since it doesn't change the playback mode (i.e. jumping while paused stays paused.) Audio control on second screen app works now, too. The split-mode functions can be useful too, since you don't have to tie a button down with a function that only works in one mode or the other.

Two issues I've found:
1 - My stick remote (SR-260) tends to become unregistered/hourglass mode a lot more frequently now, and usually when the Costar is selected. Granted it wasn't the only change made at the time, but the other drivers are a lot older, so I would presume to be more stable. Haven't had the dealer look into it yet, since it isn't happening enough to enter rage-mode on.
2 - Probably not anything that can be changed, but I am used to using the channel buttons for page scrolling, and in the new driver they default to chapter skip while in playback mode. This different function is still the case when trying to navigate K's OSD menu in playback, so scrolling through a long list of extras (hooray for shiny discs)/episodes/etc. causes problems.
 
@MikeKobb please make the skip back 5 seconds automatically turn subtitles on and then off again after like 8 seconds.
This wouldn’t work for me. When I am watching with subtitles and do a skip back I don’t want the subtitles to be switched off. What is your use case for wanting this?

John
 
This wouldn’t work for me. When I am watching with subtitles and do a skip back I don’t want the subtitles to be switched off. What is your use case for wanting this?

John
Probably if you missed something quiet, and just want to skip-back to figure out the key word(s) missed. Though, I would think a macro might be better than a hardcoded function for this.
 
My stick remote (SR-260) tends to become unregistered/hourglass mode a lot more frequently now, and usually when the Costar is selected. Granted it wasn't the only change made at the time, but the other drivers are a lot older, so I would presume to be more stable. Haven't had the dealer look into it yet, since it isn't happening enough to enter rage-mode on.
I don't think there's anything the driver could have done that would cause this.
 
My suggestion for the skip back subtitle, yes, was based on missing something said and needing them. Roku and Apple TV have features to do this.

If subs were already on and you skipped, you would not want them to be turned off.

Good thought though, I’ll see if I can program that behavior with my C4.
 
Not currently. Keep in mind that the Select button is still needed during playback if you need to navigate any menus, so I don't think that would work especially well. But, I have not used a Neeo personally.
 
But why couldn't it send both or send pause / play depending on mode of kscape. Keep in my c4 does this an option already for digital audio. here is the description. Keep in mind without this means that the neeo has no physical button to play / pause kscape currently.

Hard Button Now Playing Control:

Valid values: Yes, No.

When set to Yes, the Channel Up and Channel Down buttons will send a SKIP_FWD and SKIP_REV command when Digital Audio is playing. The ‘OK (Enter)’ button will send a Play / Pause.

NOTE: This mapping only works when Digital Audio is playing, and will only send the appropriate commands when those commands are available for the selected Digital Audio.
 
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