Starting with RTI I had 2 minor but frustrating problems.

First was leaving the USB cable hooked to an RP-6, then the T2-C wouldn't work, so I ripped everything apart for a few hours, re-checked programming over and over, re-downloaded, etc... Then finally noticed the LED on the RP-6 was on constantly... until I unplugged the USB cable from my laptop............... Lesson learned.

Second was after testing some IR codes with a T4. Then suddenly nothing works. I had coincidentally just re-done all of my system macros and really re-built the entire programming of this T4/RP-6 combo as well as re-wired how my IR was routed. So I'm going through my programming with a fine tooth comb, checking everything, re-checking wiring, pulling things apart, etc... Then, after ID not telling me that I needed to update the T4, I downloaded to it and bam there it is. Working fine..

But my BEST chasing tail story is with my first Elan install. I had never done ANY distributed audio, video, or anything like it at all. So there I am, installing a System12 with it's 40 or 50 RCA connectors on the back, and two touchscreens. We have 2 cameras and 2 touchscreens and no other video sources. The rack was on casters in an under-stairs closet. That point is important. No matter what I did, I could only get the front door cam on the kitchen touchscreen and the back patio cam on the MBR touchscreen. No matter what. Programmed, re-programmed, re-programmed, over and over and over. And if you've done Via!s before, you know they take about 5 minutes to upload programming. I was out here for weeks. 2.5 hours each way drive. Eventually, we had our Elan rep come out and he helped me. After 2 days, he was convinced we had a bad S12 and we were about to rip it out. Finally he calls one of his tech guys and hand the phone to me. I'm standing behind the rack when I find out that I had the touchscreen video plugged into the camera LOOP outputs instead of the zone outputs! So simple! The Elan rep was a bit bigger than me and couldn't fit in the little closet to see behind the rack. He would have caught it in the first 5 minutes! Because we only had 2 video sources and 2 video displays, we (meaning me, the rep, and tech support) never caught on to what was happening. All we saw was "the video isn't switching."

So stupid, but I'll NEVER make that mistake again. That Elan job took me like 2 months. I could do it in 2 days now...