ErkkilaDotOrg

So, we finally gave up on the Philips RC9800i remote. The Pronto line was just so much better, more configurable, easier to use…about all the 9800 had going for it was the color display. Things that were annoying abou it:

• you couldn’t pick which buttons you wanted displayed on the screens nor where they were displayed, nor the labels on them (except for a very few ‘user’ buttons on each remote). Even the buttons you didn’t program were left on the display to go ‘ding’ if you hit them.
• you had no control over what macro keys would appear on any given ‘watch’ remote. For example, although the ‘Watch DVD’ screen included the aspect button from the TV remote, the one for watching replay or cable tv did not. So, if you wanted to change the aspect ratio of the tv, you’d have to go to the main screen, pick individual remote, pick the remote, scroll through the screens, and find the key. On the Pronto, I always had a hard key dedicated to this function for all the remotes.
• No control at all over the functions of any of the hard keys
• Long pauses and lock-ups
• You could only scroll through device screens in one direction, meaning a LOT of screens to flip through in some cases (not to mention the annoying program guide which I never used)

In other words, it was meant for ‘ease of use’ in setting it up (wizards but no ProntoEdit), but very little configurability and ease of use for power users.
I’m going to give the old remote to my parents; their setup is less complicated and might not cause them as many issues with the remote. My dad might like it; he used to work for Philips (video cameras).
I ended up picking up a Philips TSU3500 Pronto. It’s one step up from the old TSU3000 we had. I would’ve loved a 7500 but didn’t feel like spending 6-700 hundred dollars for it; the color’s just not worth double the cost for me. Another nice thing about this choice: I had saved our old 3000 config file and was able to save it as a 3500 file and write it to the remote without having to do any new programming! I might pretty it up this weekend a bit, but it works now.

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