Im trying to program a system using an MX-950 with a MSC-400 to control a system with 3 different zones. The problem is that Im trying to figure out how to get the volume buttons to control the correct zone.

To be more clear, on the Watch page I have three options, "Theater" "Bar" and "patio" to select the zone to control. From what I understand, I can use variables to tell the volume and mute buttons which zone to operate depending on which zone is selected on the watch page. Can someone tell me how to do this? And can it be done on the MSC-400 or would I need to do it on the 950?

There's several different ways of doing this. This is one way: First, you'd have to create a variable for each room, ie. Variable1=Theater, Variable2=Bar, Variable3=Patio. At some point you will have to turn that room on, using the 950. When that happens, in the MSC400, trigger an event that turns that room Variable on. ie. If I wanna use the Bar, then on the 950 I press "Bar" and the 400 triggers a set of Variables: Theater=0, Bar=1, Patio=0. Depending on your equipment at this point, you can use conditionals to check the state of the desired rooms state (ie. IF [Theater=1] Theater Vol Up; ELSE, IF [BAR=1] Bar Vol Up; ELSE Patio Vol Up;) Or you could do something similar with the variable within the 950, and just have it go to a different device page depending on the state of the room. Make sense? Further Question? I have an email in my profile. Make the subject obvious, or I will unintentionally delete you.

That all makes sense. But the problem that I still have is that I am not sure how to program variables in the MSC-400. Can you help with that part?

Alright, so You got a new Smart Macro Group. If you don't, make one! Then make a new Smart Macro in the Group. If you open this up, it should give you that little macro window. There's a little icon that looks like two sheets of paper one blue one yellow with an arrow going between them and a big "A" right above it. Click that. This opens the "ACTION VARIABLE" window, which must always be spoken aloud with reverb in your voice in a super-hero-y kind of way. ACTION VARIABLE! right above the Add Delete buttons is where you enter names or your Variables. you can enter as many as you want (assuming its under 255) and keep adding, or deleting if you bone it. Then you select one of the items in the list you just created (when you use a lot of these, the big window on the Right shows you every macro that the Variable you have selected is associated with). At the top of this window there's a pulldown that gives you the "True", "False", or "Invert". If you select one of these options, then click okay, you'll note that in your macro window there's now a Variable with a State parameter. You can do as many variables as you need to in a macro, but unlike the other MXeditors, you'll have to assign a state to each one individually, which both sucks and is slow. And your macro window will look like you've got about a million things going on. That's pretty much it. If you wanna use a Variable in association with a conditional, in that same macro windowuse the little blue icon that says "IF" to create a conditional tree, then double click the "IF" condition in the Macro Window, select the radio button "ACTION VARIABLE" (Again Spoken aloud, with great enthusiasm. This will make your co-workers nervous. It's more fun if you pretend it's totally normal when they ask you what the hell you keep yelling that for). You can either add a new variable with the "NEW" button (This is a hard concept, I know) or use the pull down menu to use an existing variable. The last pulldown assigns a state that the conditional checks, so If I want to create a a macro that fires when Variable Var1 is False, I create a Variable called "Var1", or select "Var1" from the first pulldown menu if I've already created it, then assign the state of "False" to it, so that when the conditional fires it says "If Var1 is False, then Do execute Command A, If Var1 is True, Execute Command B"

KC,
Though I'm not the OP, and don't have a 400, I may get one in the future and I just wanted to thank you for your detailed, and very funny explanation!

URC should consider hiring you to right their documentation on the 400, as they don't seem to be in a hurry to do so themselves...


Cheers,
Neil

Thanks, Mate! Variable took me a while to wrap my head around, so if I can get other people to figure them out easier, I'd like to do that.