For any current owners of the MX-950:

What are the pros and cons that you've noticed?

And can you comment on your overall impressions?

This my personal opinion based on my customers. Customers seem to love it! The keys are labeled with words like play, stop, pause, etc. Most people you have to teach them play is the triangle, square is stop, etc. A lot of people like the watch and listen buttons. Personally, I think it add extra steps unless you have more than ten functions.

Ergonomically, it has a nice feel in the hand and not as bulky feeling as the 850 for smaller hands. Having a charging base is a big plus. Programming, the 950 is a lot more flexible.

What other remotes are you considering?

Bob

I love the 950. I'd agree that it has a better feel in the hand and I like the Watch/Listen buttons. From a programming point of view the Push and hold macros are awesome and I am just now getting into using variables and can't wait to unleash that power. The true measure however is that my wife has just told me that this is her favorite remote yet! She didn't like the touchscreen of the MX3000, didn't like the feel of the buttons on the Harmony 688 and 880 and the thought all other MX remotes were just too complicated (I'll take part of the blame because I never spent as much time programming my MX500 & 800 as I have with the 950 because it's just so interesting and fun.)

I wish my MX3000 worked as well as my MX950. Seems to be bullet proof. My family really likes it. SJ

Bob,
I have used the Pronto TSU3000, the MX-600, Harmony 880 and currrently a Crestron 1700.
I like the fell and funstionality of the MX-600 but would like it to do more macros and would like a better center "select" button.
The 880 is ok but the buttons are too close and it can't do macros.
The Crestron remote is too large to use for everyday surfing and I can't program it myself.

So, I'm looking for that "ultimate" remote that I and my wife will enjoy using.

If you like the 600 then the 850 is also a good choice. I personally like the 950 better for ergonomics but both are good! Women tend to like the 950 because of the smaller size. I also like it for clients, the charging base alone saves on customers calling me and saying their remote isn't working. I tell them to change the batteries and everything is fine. However, it might not meet everyone's price point. I think you'll like the 950 especially if you enjoy programming.

Bob

I do enjoy programming. That's the fun part of having these remotes.
Thanks for the info Bob.

I'll start with the cons first since there aren't many and not really a big deal.

1. No hard button for record for all of the heavy DVR users, not a big deal since you have to be up at the LCD for the "A,B,C" buttons.

2. No hard buttons for the page up/down which is a little annoying having to move my hand from the guide button to the LCD button.

3. Use of activesync to connect to the computer. Some people aren't having problems with this but Ive had all kinds of trouble getting the computer to recognize the device.

Likes are too many to list but the major ones are:

1. Watch/Listen buttons makes it easier for my wife to understand.

2. Feel of the remote and the buttons compared to my H880.

3. Programming capabilities of this remote and the ease to program.

I asked my wife which remote she prefers vs the H880 and she likes the 950 hands down. Is it worth $700 or $400 more than the H880, I guess it depends on how many components and what type are in your HT setup. We could have lived with the H880 but I got a deal on the 950 that I wasn't going to pass up.

Eric

Eric,
Thanks for the information.
From what I've read so far, it sounds like I'll give the 950 a try.

Good luck with it! Please check back and give us your feedback and any tips or questions!

Let me chime in on this one.

I have only had my 950 for about two weeks, but so far I much prefer it to my 700 and 850. As noted above, the feel and configuration are excellent, and I look forward to using the advanced programing functions. So far, I am finding the ability to put two macros on any button (push and hold) to be a great convenience.

Speaking of buttons, a poster above mentioned "A,B,C" buttons, and complained of no dedicated keys for page up, page down, and, I presume, next day, etc. These are just a few of the hundreds of buttons that litter the remotes that cable companies often provide. I have a Hi-Def PVR from my cable company made by SA (8300HD), and the remote has more buttons on it than an Amish prom dress. It's easily the single worst remote I have ever come across. That's one of the reasons I use the UCR remotes. (Also because I just want one remote, not 7 or 8, and it must do macros.)

Anyone who has used a TiVo would recognize that about half of these buttons would be unnecessary with a decent software interface, and they make the remote almost impossible to use in any convenient fashion. For an example, on a TiVo remote, when in the menus, CH up and CH down serve as PAGE up and PAGE down. TiVo has no A, B, or C buttons, and for the life of me I don't know why they are needed. The interface can allow for confirmations to avoid mistaken deletions without making the user hunt for a button that is used for no other purpose. I am still not happy about the fact that the FF button only cycles through the 3 different FF speeds while never stopping at PLAY. This requires the user to need to use two buttons to skip through a commercial block.

My point is -- and my stories don't usually have any point -- that the 950 is sophisticated enough to allow good programing to deal with these shortcomings to make operation of any device easier, even more so than the 850. For example, you could put a push and hold macro on the up/down and right/left cursor keys for A, B and C, so that they can be used when necessary in the dark, just by feel. I have a "delete" sequence programmed into a HOLD macro on the left cursor spot (with a few seconds delay) to make that sequence easier. On some systems, this requires several different keys.

Also, you can use the variable feature to allow the CH up and CH down buttons to function as page up and page down when you go into the program grid (I think that should work -- I intend to try that when I get some time).

It's also nice that the color of the screen can be varied with the device, which is helpful when the user has two VCRs or two TiVos.

I hate to generalize from insufficient data, but based on my first 10 days or so with the 950, I think it's a great device, and even more versitile that the 850, etc.

I do have a few complaints as well, but we will save those for another time.

Radyoactiv, the 950 has two buttons that are hidden under one. The back and Ahead buttons are toggles, if you press the inside of them then this is one function while the outside of the button is another function. On my 950 I have the outside as ff and rew, while the insde are replay and live.

The double buttons mentioned above are very nice indeed. The 950 is full of neat stuff.

Let me mention something that took me by surprise, as I have used a 700 and an 850 for several years, and I did not expect the 950 to backtrack in any significant respect. However, there is a big difference in how it documents certain macros.

If the device is one you import from the big database, there is no problem. However, if you have a device that is not in the database, and you have to use "learning" to get all your codes into the 950, which is easy to do, of course, your macros for that device will be unreadable. I noticed this when I went to program some fairly long macros for my second TiVo, which is switched to a second code set so that the two TiVos can be controlled independantly. (I have a setup and configuration macro which has to be run on a (rare) reboot which has almost 100 steps.)

Normally, the macro window reads out the buttons and the delays you have put in as numbered macro steps, such as "Pause, guide, 3, 5, enter, up, left, select." However, if the button is a code that the 950 acquired through "learning," all that reads out in the macro window is "Learned data, learned data, learned data, learned data." So every step is the same and it's impossible to troubleshoot, and would be impossible to read in order to transfer to another device, which is the way I transported it into the 950 (from the 850 editor).

The 700 and 850 do not do this; they record the name of the button the data was learned to.

There is a workaround, (there's always a workaround) because if the button in the macro is a soft button (and you have over 2000 soft buttons for each device), then the macro does record the soft label you typed in to appear in the window. So to get a macro that makes sense in the future and one that I am able to troubleshoot (and transfer if necessary), I am going to have to go back and learn all the buttons to soft keys somewhere back on pages 10 to 20 and hide those pages, but use them in the macros instead of the hard buttons. This makes no sense to me.

Maybe this can be changed in future software or firmware upgrades, or maybe not enough people have devices with codes not in the database, but it has to be common enough, I would think, that URC could be asked why this step backward was made in what was otherwise a big move forward.

Is there a place or a person at UCR to whom such an inquiry could be directed?

I feel better now.

Yeti,

Thanks for the tip, I actually saw this in another post last week when searching for something else but didn't even think to put some of the dvr buttons there. I guess I just got busy with xmas and was out of town for a week for xmas. I use the page up/down buttons a lot and might map them to the back/ahead toggle. Thanks again!

Eric

I like mine so far.

One thing I dont like is that it is really "front-heavy". In other words, holding it your hand for a very long time kind of wears on the wrist. I had to put the remote down after a while.

Another thing I didnt like (but fixed) was the pick up sensor. Disabling the pick-up sensor is a must, else all the while you hold on to the remote, it will keep turning on the backlight.

Thats about it..minor things relatively speaking. I like the remote.