In working with the third RC5400 I have programmed, I absolutely could not get Wizzit to work properly.
The program itself has several maddening lacks, things that are included in PENG and even Marantz Touch Screen Editor and the earlier versions of ProntoEdit.

Carl at Marantz tells me that I should have at least a P4 computer running at 600 mHz (1 gig would be better)and 256 megs of RAM.

All right, no problem. BUT TELL ME THAT BEFORE YOU PUT YOUR DAMNED PRODUCT ON THE MARKET. I just went to the Marantz website and could find no reference AT ALL to computer requirements. You have probably already seen my comments on the fact that there is no HELP FILE available for the remote.

So I have to buy a new laptop to use the RC5400; it has to be a laptop because I can't very well be driving back and forth between the client's house and my office for a tweak. That's a lot of bucks just because they think the 5400 is a little better. Hell, the 5200 and the TSU6000 are WAY more than any client of mine ever needed!

And the last straw, the thing that finally made me quit even thinking I could use the 5400, was that Wizzit crashed several times after I added ONE VCR command and tried to re-upload. The file just would not go into the computer.

Convince me that I can use my P2 300 mHz computer. Convince me that your program won't take four minutes to download, four minutes to upload, and then will crash. Convince me that this remote, which I am sure is much better than the 5200, offers me or my clients even ONE thing since the 5200 is already so much more than what is required.

I'll listen.

By the way, am I the only one who has noticed that hardly anybody is discussing the 5400 on this forum? I actually now hope that means it will die a quiet death.

There's been close to zero on the 5400.

It is interesting that Marantz still has not produced a help file. It's like the TSS software which also has no manual, and users having to rely on the old RCEdit manual.

Peter,

I suspect that the target user for the Marantz software is custom installers who have been to PENG or Wizz.it training.

I know that the dealer from whom I bought my first Marantz RC5000i offered customization services and was not very forthcoming about where or how to get the RCSetup software.

Ernie,

You do have some valid complaints. However, Marantz users are not alone. PPENG and PENG have the same load/upload/download problems.

FYI, I've watched the PPENG memory usage when loading a very large PCF and it never grows above 60MB. Therefore, I don't think 1GB of RAM will make much difference. 512MB, IMHO, should suffice. What is really required is a very, very, fast processor. I'm using XP with hyperthreading on a 2.4 Pentium 4C and it still takes about 3 minutes to load an 8MB PCF file.

I believe the main performance problem to be that the software loads each and every image into memory at the time the PCF is loaded. If this could change to a load-on-demand scheme, I feel that things would definitely be better.

All in fun. It's late at night and my birthday so I took a bit of liberty here. Hopefully you won't be too pissed off.

Guess you should have deep-sixed the Celeron instead of buying the RC5400.

Lyndel



This message was edited by Lyndel McGee on 06/04/04 01:47.

don't forget that the software needs to change the format from a zip file to what the Pronto really uses

Well, my wife says I am insensitive, and I guess I am, because I cannot imagine how anything you said could have pissed me off. At all. It all sounds true.

My first experience with PENG was after abandoning the 5400 and redoing the program for a TSU3000. PENG might have problems, but I find Wizzit to be an armbreaker because of how many more mouse moves and clicks are needed. For instance, in PENG, when you are assigning aliases to a number pad, the page that you opened to do number one is still open when you go to number two and open up the alias list. In Wizzit, that page is not open and you always have to scroll to it. Occasionally a page you did not open is open ( ! ), which simply tells me the software does not work correctly.


Okay, now that is both true AND funny. Unfortunately, the Celeron is mine and I am working with a company that collects the profit on the remote, so replacing the computer is not a multi-remote zero sum game, it is a multi-multi remote zero sum game.

Looks like I need to make some different arrangements....

Folks,

Didn't I read somewhere that Whizz!It files could go into PENG if you made a change to a comment in the file? Daniel wrote something about this several months ago. I was just thinking out loud that maybe you could create the WhizzIT file in Peng and then make the change to the comment file and possibly it could go back into WizzIT? Just a thought that maybe you could do the work in PENG and then move it back as needed to a WizzIT file????

Dave D'Arche
Http://ProntoGuide.com

The reason for the "sorry if I piss you off" comment above was the text below that I removed from the original post.

P.S. My wife is laughing her head off because you appear too cheap to buy a "good" computer but spent mega bucks on the RC5400. Boys will be boys and oooh, the price of their toys.

Lyndel

Ok, and a big LOL to you AND your wife. I like her sense of humor. Also, I would laugh at myself for this and totally agree with her, except I actually am programming this for a customer who is paying for the remote. I am used to charging for the time that it takes to program any of the non-NG remotes, and the difficulties that I am encountering make me have to back up a step and say that these products are simply not in shape to be programmed for a fee, because the programs do not just plain work like the pre-NG programs did. I have programmed Lexicon 500Ts and 700Ts, Crestron STS, Pronto 1000s, 2000, 6000, and Marantz 5000i and 5200s. The NG is totally in a class by itself. As I commented somewhere else, they have put the "F" back into "NG."

And they subconsciously KNOW that this stuff is not up to par. Why else would they first name a product (I first typed "problem" instead of "product" there) NG, which we all subconsciously recognize as an abbreviation for "No Good," usually with the "F" in the middle? Then Marantz has the senselessness to name their program "Wizz" anything?

It sounds like you are saying that I should not be so upset because the RC5400 and Wizzit do not work well enough, because the previous versions of the software, for the Pronto product, have the same problems.

I take that to mean that the whole kit and kaboodle of these remotes are too problematic for an installer to rely on as programming time is way higher due to these problems.

As I have said once before, this series put the "F" back into "NG."

Good Day!

The minimum requirements for Marantz's Wizz.it software are: PIII, 600 MHz, 16 MB of Video Graphics Memory. A faster microprocessor and more video graphics memory will only improve the performance of the software. A lot of recent effort has been put into the release of Wizz.it 9 software for the RC9500. Many of the things that Wizz.it for the RC5400 lack have been implemented in the Wizz.it 9 software, and will find their way into the RC5400 software after Wizz.it 9 has been released.

Dave Stoneburner
Marantz America, Inc