I'm adding another room to my own home at the moment. I need a keypad on the wall for control of the AV, the lights and window actuators.

My experience (with programmable controls) is with URC remotes and programming (and troubleshooting), Speakercraft and Philips/Marantz. I want to connect to either just an IR hub or perhaps a control processor such as MSC400 or RP-1 or 6. Don't know enough to make a decision on the RTI processor yet.

Keypad options available to me are RTI, Russound, Elan Ole, Niles and Speakercraft.

I have tried the Russound unit before and hated it. The Elan looks good but lacks the customisation I'm looking for. Really need to have buttons I can change the text on.

Not up to date with Niles. Looked old hat when I last looked. Speakercraft all require a seperate processor or DA system to work.

Leaves me with RTI. I was looking at the RK2 or RK3. I have seen the B+K keypad and would like to get my hands on it but no one imports B+K. Shame.

So, the RK2 or RK3 looks like my keypad choice. But for my own use and for using in my clients systems, I was considering the URC MSC400 with MX900 or exploring the RTI range. What I think I need are some informed opinion on the differences between the 'Improved' URC models and RTI. For example if you were having trouble with the lower end of URC and moved up the scale to the narrowband URC products and macros stored on the processor, is there such a difference when compared to the RTI line? What are the capability differences between the MSC400 and the RTI units?

I can't get good advice from the distributors here as they don't really 'know' what they are selling to be honest.

For comparison of price I can buy a T1 for same price as an MX900.

All RTI's processors store macros on board.

The MSC is more advanced than anything RTI has currently but that's about to change. The RTI can work in an IR only domain as well too.

The RTI programming has a very, and I'll repeat, VERY steep learning curve. BUT, it does pay to use it and the remotes are second to none.

We use URC and RTI almost equally,

Ive not worked with the RTI products yet, although we have discussed trying them. But when using an MSC400, the URC products are great. Ive had flawless performance out of the 400's we've put in.

As for B&K keypads, they leave a lot to be desired, in my opinion. They are really a URC MX700 in a slightly different layout. We do a lot of B&K systems and have discussed using the RTI keypads or touch panels instead of the B&K pads.

for an in wall keypad, the rk3 without doubt. they are my go to when i need a keypad for any z2/z3 application.

not that hard to learn if you can program other brands.

Just wondering why you think this?
I dont know alot about the MSC but from what i understand it is not two way 232 and cant take an IR macro trigger so if anything it is on the same level or a little behind the RP1/6 due to the lack of IR triggering


I personally think the RTI is one of the easiest remotes out there to program. give anyone with some remote programming under their belt an hour or two and they will be fine.

I always thought RTI was the most intuitive and straightforward. I don't know if you could say that about the Pronto or URC.

I second this. I have programmed all three. They all have features I wish the others had but I find RTI to be the most flexible in general. They also have the best and most elegant controllers in my opinion (I can not stand the video game style of the mx3000 and neither can most of my clients) and they are generally conservative with their new product releases. this can be frustrating but I find that it is often preferable to be better than being first. I am looking forward to the next wave.

We are a URC shop.

We are also new to the MSC-400 but it seems to be flawless, and YES, there is no two way coomunication.

But my advise, pick a brand then cherry pick a ccouple of there remotes that best fit your installations and learn them inside and out.

Look at other peoples remotes and ask yourself why they use some of the fetures they did. Every thraining I go to I pick up new ideas from the teacher and the really good ideas come from other installers in the room.

Mike

RTI has remotes, touchpanels, and processors. All on one format, which you can do all in one file. B&K with the RTI keypads is a very nice combination. We do a lot of RK3's and a few of the K4's, but usually step up the project to Crestron when we get into K4 budgets.

I found RTI programming to be pretty intuitive, but I started out programming the Intelicontrol when it first came out.

Ill third this.
Every once in a while Ill have to program a URC (client supplied, back from when I sold URC, etc) and I find myself having to "retrain" myself. It might be normal lack of use "forgetfullness", but they are laid out entirely different. I much prefer RTI, very intuitive.

RTI has 6 different hand held remotes, 4 different in-wall touch panels, 3 different single gang push button controllers, 3 different wireless processors (if you include the XP-8) You can use up to 10 remote antennas with 2 of the processors in the line. RTI also has voltage sensors, video sensors RS-232 integration, they are port addressable & have assignable contact closures, the XP-8 is bi-directional, & has a built in astronomical time clock in it to trigger events like sprinklers and lights. You can stack as many processors as you want into a single project file, so you could literally have 100s of assignable outputs if need be. All of the RTI product line can be integrated into a single working system on one desktop screen. The software is easy to use any one who says it is not, has probably never really sat down and used it for more than half an hour. Also RTI has great customer support.


RTI is a whole lap ahead of URC in the remote race, end of story

Except they're ugly.

Really....?





Matter of taste really...

Well, you picked the ugliest URC to compare to the nicest RTI. Pull up the MX-980 or MX-810 if you want to compare apples.... yes I'm too lazy to try and figure out my photobucket account...

lol... not trying to argue, but after seeing the 980 I had to post these two pics.

the 950 vs 980...

950:


980:


Looks to me they copied the colour sceme and caught up to the RTI's colour LCD.

810:


This is the worst of the 4...IMHO. Again, I'm not meaning to argue. It's just a matter of taste I think.