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Welcome to Project 24

The Xbox Sleep Timer

1 Project Overview

The Motivation of this project stems from waking up far too often in the middle of the night to find the Xbox 360 still on. With the inclusion of Netflix, the Xbox has become one of the best ways to stream movies and shows and, yet unlike all TVs, the Xbox does not have a sleep timer. The Xbox 360 consumes about 150 watts of power and also has fans that can be very noisy (not pleasant to wake up to). The primary goal of this project is to design a TV remote control sized device to automate the process of shutting down the console after a specified amount of time. This project also has two secondary goals. The first is to create a device that makes navigating media menus and controlling playback easier than using an Xbox controller. Also, implementing the aforementioned features in a compact size with low power consumption. The device will be designed with a display to indicate a time until shut down, as well as buttons to control the increment and decrement. The device will use a micro-controller to keep track of time and wirelessly send the signal to control the Xbox 360. Two concerns for this device will be the size and power consumption. The device will be powered by 2 AA batteries and must have a battery longevity approximately equivalent to a mid-high end TV remote control. The device will be a stand alone control for the Xbox’s media feature. The stand alone remote control for the media features will include arrow buttons, select, and back to navigate menus as well as rewind and fast forward buttons. There is a possibility of working with Microsoft on this device which would allow the use of an embedded design. If Microsoft becomes involved, we could more easily achieve a small size and low power consumption, as well as open up features that may not be within our reach otherwise.

After much consideration for customer needs (The sleepy college gamer and TV connoisseur), the list below was created.

* Low power consumption One of the primary goals of the sleep timer is to conserve power, so the electronics used to accomplish this cannot itself consume very much power.The device will use the same power scheme as an Xbox 360 controller, 2 AA batteries.

* Standby mode for micro-controller/display For this design there will be a display to indicate how much time is left until sleep. Following up on the power consumption need, we need the display to shut off whenever the user does not have a need to see the time, and to quickly turn on if the user desires to change the sleep settings. In order to further conserve power, we will also need a micro-controller that has a standby function.

* Must wirelessly control Xbox Wires are a thing of the past when it comes to game controllers, which brings us to the conclusion that no customer is going to want a wired control just so they can have a sleep function. Wires could also be hazardous while sleeping, we want to give the customer the option of sleeping with the controller on their chest without the risk of a wire strangling them while they sleep.

* Small size The customer needs a device that does not create uncomfortable sleeping positions due to the desire to sleep with the remote. Also, everyone is accustom to a certain range of sizes when it comes to a remote control, our device is no exception to this expectation.

* Incremental time settings After researching various sleep functionality of TVs, we have decided the laziest way to set a sleep timer is to repeatedly push a button until the time desired is reached. The other option we were considering was to set a time in the 12 hour (or 24 hour) clock format.

* User-friendly buttons In the very real situation of a sleepy user accidentally overshooting his desired sleep time (tragic), we decided upon a two button scheme, one button to increase time and the other to decrease. The buttons will also loop back around once the time has reached a min or max. As an example, if the user desires the max amount of time, a single press of the decrement button will take him there. Very user-friendly.

* Visual user Interface Being able to easily see the time settings on the device while not being blinded by the back-lit display late at night will be an important design consideration.

2 Background Research
3 System Requirements and Desired Features
4 Design Solutions
5 Top Level Block Design

5.1 Power Supply
5.2 Remote Micro-controller
5.3 RF Transmitter
5.4 User Interface
5.5 IR Circuit
5.6 RF Receiver
5.7 Base Micro-controller
5.8 Remote Code
5.9 Remote Container
5.10 Base Code
5.11 Base Container