The remote is never by the phone. This small, 2 penlight battery, device would mute the television when the phone rings.

So really just a light clapper where the input is a more consistant telephone ring tone and the switched output is a infra-red code for muting or reducing the volume to zero.

When ordering, your TV and phone model has to be given for ROM chip programming.

As a phone tone is easily generated on other devices it may also become a simple link in a more complex system.
-- wjt, Nov 18 2011

http://www.tvbgone.com [pocmloc, Nov 18 2011]

I'm sure you know that a universal remote can be programmed by setting it to receive signals from the remote you want to duplicate. So your mini-remote simply needs to be able to receive the coded signal that represents "mute", for whatever make/model of TV remote you normally use.
-- Vernon, Nov 19 2011


How is that automatic? pocmloc. Very high end universal remote systems are computer controlled which could possibly handle a audio signal but I would like a cheap, place and forget box. Maybe even a electronic build kit.The audio tone recognition would be the difficult bit.
-- wjt, Nov 20 2011


Just a thought, if the phone rings in a movie, and the ring is the same as you home phone, the TV will mute. Very low probability though.
-- wjt, Nov 20 2011


I like it, but i would prefer if it would pause my shows instead! +
-- bob, Nov 20 2011


Don't televisions with audio command functions already exist?
-- Alterother, Nov 20 2011


Some satellite tv services can display caller ID onscreen when a phone call is received. An automatic mute function could be an additional service.
-- tatterdemalion, Nov 21 2011



random, halfbakery