Count me in as another US user who is desperate for colored hard buttons on the Harmonys! In fact, I bought their Xbox 360 remote just for the colored buttons, not because I have an Xbox. And the reason I'm stuck with Harmonys instead of some other brands is the phonepad-sytle pairings of letters with each of the number keys. This is essential for anyone who owns a Squeezebox.

My new Scientific Atlanta 8300HD STB has 4 colored buttons I use exhaustively; my Panny plasma TV has 4 colored buttons, my brother-in-law's Dish Network remote has 4 colored buttons, and his Sammy LCD TV has 4 colored buttons. And these are all just plain colored buttons with no labeled function. As devices become more complex and have more settings, colored buttons will become more common because key overloading can't be avoided.