ComAir

ComAir is the internal name of an ultrasonic communication protocol employed by 2012 and Boom Furbys. It has been developed by GeneralPlus, who manufacture the microcontrollers used in those Furby models.

ComAir communication is used for interaction between Furbys and also with the mobile applications.

A patent which appears to be relevant: US Patent US8160276B2.

Example[]

Playing this file to your 2012 or Boom Furby should result in them burping: The same, but with all frequencies scaled down 10x so that they can be heard (no longer affects a Furby):

How it works[]

ComAir uses 5-tone ultrasonic frequency-shift-keying to transmit 6 or 18-bit messages. The center frequency used by Furbys is either 17, 18 or 17.5 kHz (depending on the mode), which is the reason why the sound of Furby communications might be audible or even somewhat irritating to some people.

In the typical Furby use case, two 6-bit messages encode a 10-bit command number (ranging from 0 to 1023)^[1]^[2]. Most of those command numbers are understood both by 2012 and Boom Furbys, allowing them to interact despite the model difference.

In addition, the Boom app uses a special status request to which a long, 36-bit message is returned by the Furby; this is called the Boost mode.

It's only used when the application connects to a Boom during start-up, perhaps due to the fact that the transmission is longer and much more audible (the regular command signals use a 17.5 kHz center frequency; this one uses two simultaneous carriers on 17 and 18 kHz).

That response contains the name of a Furby, their fur style and the hunger/sickness stats, allowing the application to identify which Furby it's used with (a warning is displayed when the Furby Boom is not the one registered in a particular saved game) and show the user the corresponding status data.