Need a bit of help please. I left my Harmony 880 cause I could not stand the software that would "sometimes" work. I understand there is no comparison programming between the two either. first let me include my list of equipment before asking my question. Rotel surround rsp-1098 rotel dvd xbox360 dish network vip622 and sony projector VPL-VW50...... now my question does my projector have to show in the watch portion listed...lets say watch dvd... turns the projector on sets the input turns the dvd on etc.... i just really see no need to have the projector list under the watch function of the mx-950.... I maybe just stuck thinking like a harmony. Any help would be great....thanks

You can have your devices anywhere you want. Also your activities.

Some people use the Watch side for their devices, and the Listen for their Activities.

That is up to you. Whatever works for you and your family.

There are many codes that you may even want to hide on pages so that they can be used in macros for your activities, but not be used by the people around you.

So, your all or most of your projector codes would be hidden, and you still control whatever you need from the Watch DVD activity.

Does that make sense? Have I answered your question?

Feel free to ask more!

just as an example of what i've jacked with....for my xbox 360 under the macro settings is 1. power toggle (projector) 2. sets the projector input 3.power the av receiver 4. sets the av receiver input to 3 then the GO TO Page xbox 360.

how do i set a macro to turn them all off and from the button on the right column?

thanks for you response and allowing me to ask these basic questions....

Yup, you were thinking like Harmony.

There's no limitations to the MX-950. You can program it any way you want.

In response to your last post, have you read the programming manual yet (found under the files section of this site)?

I recently got into programming my MX-950 and I can tell you that it is totally flexible and you can implement things however you want to. I have used the following approach with great success so far:

1. Create all your devices on the MX-950

First create and setup control sets for each of the devices in your system. In other words, go ahead and try to duplicate all of the critical remote functions that you want to use for each of your devices on the MX-950 first, before you try to go in and set up any macros.

2. Set up "rough" macros

Once the devices you want to use are created, you can easily create your macros by hitting the little "record" button, and then going through the steps that you would normally go through on your various remotes to turn on the devices you want for a given activity, select inputs, select sound settings, etc. Then you will have all of the basic commands you need in your given macro.

3. Fine tune and optimize your macros

After you have all the commands you need in a given macro, you can go in and fine tune it by inserting delay times and/or rearranging the order of the commands. For example, my plasma TV when it is furst turned on, needs about 3.5 seconds before you can select the video input you want to use. So, in my macros that involve this TV, I changed the order of other system commands so that the remote can "multi-task" and take care of these items while giving the TV the 3.5 seconds it needs before selecting the desired input. This keeps the overall length of the macros shorter.

How you organize things is up to you. My main goal for my universal remote project was to get something bulletproof implemented so that I did not have to spend 15 minutes briefing our babysitters on how to use my system to play movies for our kids. So my system is as dumb-simple as possible. On my first page under "Watch" there are three choices: TV/TIVO, DVD, and VIDEOTAPE. If you click VIDEOTAPE, it triggers the macro that will 1. Turn on all equipment needed for this activity (using discrete power codes), 2. configure inputs and settings on the TV and receiver, and 3. turn OFF equipment that is not needed for this activity (using discrete codes), and then 4. goes to the page 1 screen for my VCR device. I even created a red-backlit "MACRO IN PROGRESS" screen that shows up when any macro is triggered, and remains in place until the macro completes, in order to keep un-technical users from interfereing with the command script and screwing things up.

I set up the main "Off" button at the top right of the remote, to trigger a macro that ALWAYS turns off everything in the system, no matter what activity is in progress.

I was able to set up the MX-950 so that it is so simple, that even my 8 year old stepson has no trouble setting up a DVD or Videotape to watch without any assitance from an adult.

I have found that the MX-950 is so excellent because you can combine the benefits of both activity based setups AND device based setups for the absolute ultimate in flexibility. So, for example, if there are functions from other devices that are frequently used in combination with a given device, like changing the sound setting from THX to 5 Channel Stereo on my receiver while watching different channels on TIVO, I simply create those functions as part of the TIVO device by copying the native IR codes from the receiver device I already set up in the MX950. None of the previous universal remotes I worked with allowed for this kind of flexibility.

I hope this gives you some ideas about ways you can set up your MX-950. When my complete system setup is fully refined and tested, I will probably post it to this website. In the meantime, if you would like to see it, let me know and I will be happy to E-mail you the file so you can explore it.

Good luck.

I don't think anyone specifically answered his question, so I'll try.

You don't need to show any gear you dont want to or need to. For example. Hit watch and your choices may be HD, DVR, DVD, Fireball. You can have your codeset for the HD box under Hd, DVR uner DVR, etc but have a page 2 hidden and put the codes for your projector and AVR. I'd also suggest hiding most codes for the cable box, DVD, DVR, etc. The less buttons for the users, the less confusing.

For listen, you could have Cable, CD, FM, XM whereas cable could all be macros from the cable box with numbers punched thru, CD could have the CD codesete, FM & XM could be nothing more than favorites done as presets from the AVR.

So the AVR and projector codes are hidden from the end user and commands are called from within the macros. I tend to dumb down my remotes to make them easy to use.

Does that make sense?