Future Ideas

The original specification of the project called for the implementation of a bus protocol to communicate between the base station and the remote satellites. Although this proved to not be necessary to meet the specification of the remainder of the design, the next version of this system would utilize the serial peripheral interface. This would allow for multiple microcontrollers to communicate with the base station and reduce the wire interconnect overhead from 16 wires to 3.

Additional work could be done on the amount of information available to the user at a remote satellite. Larger LCD panels could provide more information, and additional features such as the ability to provide a winamp playlist and allow users to select songs from this playlist. In addition, it could provide a menu for the user to select options, change device names, control the system volume, and even control a digital equalizer. Computer software could be written to allow the user to setup the system from a PC. This would allow the system to support a wide range of audio equipment by programming the device with the specific IR codes the devices require. This will also allow the system to grow with the user and allow for code updates to be obtained online.