LIRC 0.10.1 seems to hate my remote..

It is a weird situation, and I did not have the issue using kernel-3.16.5
and LIRC 0.9.0, I am now using kernel-4.17.19 with LIRC 0.10.1 on 2 nearly
identical systems. The only difference between them is that on one I have a
Lenovo USB IR receiver and on the other I have an HP IR receiver. This
should not matter as they have never mattered in the past and have been
perfectly fine since an 0.8 build of LIRC.

For a remote I have a Logitech Harmony Ultimate that is programmed as a
Tivo_S2, as well as a slim HP MCE remote. Again, these were operational on
the 0.9.0 version, but after 2+ years I decided to upgrade the systems,
kernel LIRC and everything else.

 

Now on to the issue. On boot, the Logitech remote will not work. It will not
control the program I want it to, and I do not see any messages in IRW that
it is even seeing the button presses. I do however see the LED on the
receiver acknowledge that it sees a button press.

If I use the MCE remote, the program responds and IRW prints the button
presses, but here is where it gets weird. Now that I have used the MCE
remote, the Logitech starts working. I can use the Logitech perfectly fine
any button I press works, I see a response in the program and I see a IRW
printout if I have it open.

Stranger still, after a period of time of inactivity, LIRC again stops
"seeing" the Logitech again.. But again, if I use the MCE remote first, then
the Logitech works again after that. It is almost like LIRC is going to
"sleep" and the MCE remote needs to "wake" it up.

 

Another solution seems to be to restart LIRCD, then the Logitech works, but
still has the timeout after a few mins.. and I need to use the MCE remote
again, or restart LIRCD again.

 

Looking for ideas here, other than setting up a cronjob to restart LIRC
every few mins, or using 2 remotes..

 

MarcT