For those of you who use these by assigning buttons, rather than a source input or turning on a zone (including Main power), setting the triggers to Off for all inputs will result in the triggers being active when the Main zone turns on. This will be a problem if they're triggering a screen, projector lift, power amp, etc when you don't want this to happen.

The solution came from someone in Tech Support- he said that if I assign the trigger(s) to an unused input (like Tuner), it will work and I verified this while the call was ongoing.

Awesome info. Thanks for sharing.

Craig

What?

I'm having trouble envisioning the scenario. Are you saying there is a scenario where setting the triggers all to OFF will turn them all on?
I ask this because you change terminology without explanation. You say "setting to Off" then you say "being active." Are those the same thing or different?

In my world, if a trigger is active, it can be set on or off. If it can't be set on or off, then it's in some default state, probably OFF.

I understood it to mean if you don't have the trigger assigned
to an input then it will will turn on and off with the main power command, not with individual button presses as intended, even though you don't want it to.

The fix is to assign it to an unused input, where it will no longer activate with main power, and can be controlled by the buttons you assigned it to.

Craig

I agree with Craig’s interpretation. And, if you think about it, this would be a good scheme to control a speaker selector box.

Just play with the 3400 you're working with.

Yes, setting them all to Off causes the triggers to activate when the Power On command is issued. Made no sense to me, so I called.

There's a separate setting for 'On with Main' and that's the reason I called Tech Support- the Living Room speakers are powered by an Audio Research tube amp and I don't want to turn it on/off repeatedly or rapidly.

I already wrote that assigning it to an unused port fixes it and in the original AVR at this house, I used the Zone 2 source commands to control the triggers but this time I'm using additional zones and I didn't see any Zone 2 or Z3 commands for the triggers. I don't remember the triggers being ON when I powered the Main zone before, but I set that AVR up over ten years ago.

I added commands for turning the amplifiers on and off in the remote's buttons in each activity- it lets him shut off the house amp if he only wants to listen in the living room and it's the way I programmed the last remotes- it works well; I don't need any extra parts since the house amp (solid state) has its own trigger in and the Audio Research is connected to a triggered outlet in the Furman Elite.

Is it a 3400 that you are using in this set up you are referring to? I happen to have a 3400 in my own system.

This is very interesting to me so I plan to do some experimentation of my own in the new year.

Thanks again for the usefull info.

Craig.

I did a 4300 in this one (with another in their second home), Ernie has a thread about a 3400 and that's the reason I directed that at him. If I had a way to design this stuff, ALL AVRs would have at least two 12V triggers, IR input jacks on the rear for those who don't use IP/serial control and the video section would be a removable module so failures and upgrades could be handled without removing the whole receiver. Of course, the manufacturers wouldn't push as many boxes, but our lives would be better. Fortunately for us, IP control is gaining traction so IR will be a thing of the past.

In this system, I have two pieces being shared (ReQuest server, AVR and Parasound P5 preamp) by the two remote hubs and all three of these have an IR port- the triggers turn each amp on; the Mac used for the distributed audio has its own port and the Furman is triggered to power the Audio Research. That gives me the freedom to use the IR receiver without needing to put two emitters over them, unless I decide to use the cable I made that has diodes to isolate the outputs from two hubs.

I had originally installed an older Krell Home Theater Standard preamp in the second home- when I turned it to see the rear, I was surprised to see that it had 5 or 6 assignable 12V trigger ports. I used one for the power amp, one for the projector screen and one for the projector lift- made controlling the last two very easy when they weren't needed, rather than splitting the lead or trying to cobble something together with relays and delays.

I don't know if you're a member at Audioholics, but they tested some AVRs to see which met output power specs and which didn't- the Denon met or exceeded and some others that are very popular didn't.

If you haven't seen the real effect of using ECO mode, go to Audioholics- he measured the performance with and without- just don't use it- it limits the power supply and you lose output.

The homeowner and I were discussing the system one night and his wife walked past, saying "You guys are such dorks!". We smiled and said "Yes, yes, we are".