I've played around a little with the variable feature of the MX3000 and my instincts tell me this is a very powerful feature but I'm not sure I appreciate everything it can do. It seems like it tracks the "position" of IR that toggles and would be useful where there is not a discrete IR (i.e. video 1, video 2, video 3, video 4; or power on or off). Is this correct? I imagine there may be much more to it and more it can do. Can someone give me a good rundown on the "variables" feature?


Thanks

It is far more powerful that just being used as a "workaround" for toggle IR codes. Here is a quick example of a recent MX3000 program I did for a client's dedicated HT. He has a Runco DLP projector that has a "warm up" time before it will accept input changes. I programmed this quite long delay (30+ seconds) into the macros for "Watch Satellite" and "Watch DVD". Well, if the system is already on, who wants to sit through the delay when switching between sources? No one. So a easy place to use a variable is here. I set the Projector On command to trigger a variable to go high (1). And then my macros have 2 states. One for if the Projector is on (variable set to 1) and another for if the Projector is off (variable set to 0...done during the System Off macro). If the Projector is off, it issues the On command and inserts the proper delay before changin video inputs. If the projector is already on, it skips those steps.

Another use I have found helpful is changing the appearance of certain buttons. In the same program mentioned above, I am controlling a basic 2 zone Lutron Grafik-Eye lighting switch. Well when you put in a movie, the lights go down. Nice....well what if you have to take a leak, or answer the door, or whatever? Naturally, you would pause the movie...but what about the lights? Do you want to trip over your shoes, a pet, or a bucket of chicken? haha....I added a button labelled "Break" on the DVD page. So when you need to take a quick break from the show, press it. The movie pauses, and the lights ramp up to a comfortable level. Then the button changes from saying "Break" to saying "I'm Back"...press the button, and the lights slowly dim back down and the movie picks up where it left off. The variable is used to change the state of the button and the IR commands it issues when pressed.

Once you get the idea of what you can do with variables, you really start to get creative and intuitive with your programming. And basically once you do a few, the learning curve is done...you just have to find new and cool ways to implement this new found knowledge. :) Good luck!

I am sure more people will respond with even more ellaborate variable uses. But start basic and you will naturally work up to more advanced programming.

I agree with Audiophiliac. The variables are very powerful.
I use them in a few different ways.
1. To keep track when and what equipment is on or off. I can then adjust macros to do different things dependng on the state of a variable. An example of this is I sometimes use the TV for sound and other times use my Yamaha Receiver. I can use the same volume control buttons for either. If the receiver is ON then volume is Audio-Vol+/-. If receiver is off then volume is TV-VOL+/-. Also for equipment that does not have discreet codes it won't turn off equipment that is already on just because the power command is in a macro.
2. I also use the variables for changing buttons to reflect things like if the power is on the button may be green but if off then red.
3. Also of course for the system button ie: where you press the DVD button (more than 1 sec... see below) it turns on the appropriate equipment and leaves on ones that should be on and turns off any that should not.
3.There are also button press timings. If you hold down a button for more than x seconds it will perform a different funcion. I use this in one example for when I am in my guide. There are times when I press select that it goes out of the guide and times that it does not. I use a different device just for the guide so my hard buttons work differently in the guide and you go to the guide from any device and return to the originating page. But when the guide is no longer displayed on the TV gut the guide page is still on my screen, if I would press the guide button again, the screen would change but the guide would re-appear on the tv. If I hold the guide button down for more than 1 second, it changes the remote screen without affecting the state of the guide on the tv.
Another example is if you press a device button on the main menu for more than 1 second, it will power on/off equipment needed but a quick press leaves everything alone and just changes to that device page.

Ideas...
I created a power screen to turn on or off any component I want. The whole screen works with variables. I have an ON and OFF button and the colos change to show what is on and what is off. Very neat compared to the similar scrren I had on my pronto.
To help keep track of the variable for power, I have a screen that I can use just to change the state of any variables and works similar to the power screen.
Since a lot of the time I come home and the TV may already be on, I have a button on my main page just to turn on the TV and PVR variables since I usually turn off all equipment with my remote the night before but my mom that lives with me uses the PVR remote to turn them back on.

Variable can be used to do many things and make the remote much more configurable and easier and more fun to use.

I created a full-screen animation of the classic "sweeping movie countdown" that uses variables to perform the animation. Because this method isolates screen changes to one very small area at a time, it allows the animation to work full-screen without slowdown.

Also, my configuration has four pages of favorite channels. I use variables and macros to track the most recently viewed page of favorites, so that when I press my Favorites button, I always return to the page of favorites I last looked at.

A while back I created a template that tracked the state of transport controls on a VCR, DVD, or CD player. ie: Press Play, and the screen says Play... go off and do anything else, and when you come back, the screen still says Play (or rewind, or record, or whatever).

Thanks. Indeed, this is a very powerful tool to allow much creativity in the customization.