and

Let me suggest that you may never know why this is happening, but that doesn't need to stop you from solving it. I loved the days when I was on salary and my boss told me to work out why something was happening. These days I don't have the time to devote to teasing out the details. I have to make it work using the quickest methods, not the most thorough analysis.


I missed this the first time through. Good catch, buzz. I now also wonder what can possibly be gained by using two receivers if they're right next to each other. You've already mentioned a drawback to this, which is that the IR signal to the second floor must be turned up all the way to work.

Knowing that URC has RF problems, and wanting to control systems on two different floors, I'd put distance between the MRF-350s by putting each one on the floor of the system it's controlling. Or did I still read this wrong and some equipment for both systems resides in the basement?

What are you trying to accomplish by putting the two MRF-350s next to one another? And doesn't this mean you have to run IR outputs from the basement to the second floor? Isn't the most straightforward approach, not to mention the shortest wires, usually the best approach?

Another thing occurs to me: The longer the IR wire is, the more it's possible for the IR signal to become distorted by the capacitance of the wire. (I have some experience with this and with solving it, but my methods won't work if you have barely enough signal to begin with.) Interference can also get on the wire that modifies the waveform of the control signal.

And RF can be picked up by the IR wire and fed back into the MRF-350s.

I say separate the MRF-350s.