Regarding the modem, did you know that many of the Radio Shack remotes up to and including the 15-1925 all have internal modems. You can call up UEIC and have them "play" the codes over the phone, you hold the remote up to the earpiece and it updates itself.

This is the same technology that they are going to use in the new Mosaic, only now they've made it even better because you can download wave files to your PC, then play them and update the remote using the PC speakers.

If you see a 15-1917, 15-1918, 15-1919 or 15-1925 remote on eBay or something, pick it up, it has a modem inside!

Later,
Rob.