Yes, you will need to stick IR emitters on your equipment's IR sensor windows. Any industry standard emitter (such as those made by Xantech) will do. They come either as single or dual emitters per plug, perhaps even more. In your case, you will need at least 2 duals and four singles to cover 8 devices on 6 IRF ports. As an alternative, you could use an IR blaster. These come either as in-wall units, or as table-top devices. Only recommended if the blaster has line-of sight to the equipment.
Since the T2 transmits RF signals to the IRF, you will not need anything else to control your equipment from another room, provided that the RF range in your scenario is adequate.
The zoning feature is useful for controlling equipment in different rooms. Suppose that you have two identical satellite receiver boxes, each in a different room. Via extended wiring, you can use IR emitters to connect each box to your IRF. But without zoning, each time you send a sat-receiver command (e.g. channel up), both boxes would respond. The zoning feature allows you to limit an IR command to one or more specified ports on the IRF. This way you can send signals for box 1 on one port, and signals for box 2 on on a different port. When you assign an IR command to a button in the T2 configuration software, you can specify to which IRF port(s) the command should be sent.
Agree....with prices like this you'll want to know what you are buying! :-)
