A quick trip to http://www.irda.org/ should help you along. The main problems with IR are environmental, smoke and objects moving across the beam can wreak havoc on an IR system. Most IR systems are protocol agnostic, provided that it is a serial data stream, and it's a good way to replace any cable provided you have a good line of sight. Not sure what other type of information you need, IR is about a strait forward as a media converter can get.
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"The future is here. It's just not widely distributed yet." -William Gibson
IRDA
