I have been considering the MX3000 for a while now. However since I do have an Escient Fireball, 2-way communication would be a nice feature to have. I was hoping some news of the MX3500 would come out of CEDIA but my dealer didn't hear anything.

What was interesting from CEDIA were the Pronto Pro TSU9600 and the Harmony 1000. Both of which look like direct competitors to the MX3000. The TSU9600 being in competition with the MX3500 whenever it finally hits the market assuming the MX3500 does have Fireball support.

I love my URC remote, but these look like some pretty strong competition for the URC touch screens. The Harmony, well it is a Harmony, but its MSRP is half the price of the MX 3000. The Pronto is more money but does provide 2 way with wifi. Both are very good looking.

So any thoughts on the competition or any insight as to what URC will be bringing out next to compete in this space?

Regards,

Dennis

The URC MX-3500 will look exactly like the MX-3000 and will be 2 way, but exactly what will be received by it is unknown. It may only be component status info relayed from something like the MSC-400.

As far as it being WiFi enabled, I doubt it. I tried to talk URC into the benefits of WiFi over two years ago, and they just couldn't see the benefits.

Perhaps they've changed their mind since then.

The Harmony really isn't anything more than a color version of their last remote. If you like the Harmony, you would probably like it.

As far as the Pronto Pro is concerned, I think URC will HAVE to come up with something similar in order to compete in the $1000 to $1500 remote control range.

But, it needs to be more than just a remote control. It needs to be more of a remote commander like the Pronto with links to the PC and/or other WiFi enabled components.

I think that URC has been spending their time working on their RF issues, which are much, much better now with the RFX-250, the MRF-350 and the MSC-400.

Now, I think they need to work on a WiFi enabled remote commander with 2 way communications.

The MX-3000 and the MX-950 run on a version of Windows CE, so URC already has the expertise to at least start a move into WiFi.

IMHO.

Greg

I agree with Greg. I was impressed with the TSU9600 and if it's real world performance is a good as promised, I can see it as a strong competitor to the MX-3000 (and beyond). The Harmony 1000 was really just a touchscreen version of the 890 (no fully customizable graphics), so I would think touchscreen fans would rather have a TSU3500 for around the same price.

Mike
www.SurfRemoteControl.com

Mike,

When will you be getting a sample to play with? It says on their site that it is compatible with a fireball right out of the box. I assume this means with the optional serial controller, the rfx9600? Is this correct?

Thanks for your help!

kind regards,

Dennis