There have been many posts on this forum about the infamous "Remote not connected" error. My PC has Windows ME on it and I've run into this problem myself.

After many, many hours of updating and reinstalling and updating and searching and reformatting the HDD and reinstalling Windows ME and all updates available from Microsoft, HP (the computer vender) and even Intel (the chip manufacture used by HP for their USB ports) I've come to a couple conclusions.

Although ProntoEdit (latest and greatest 2.0.9) runs fine under Windows ME, Windows ME flat will NOT communicate with the TSU 3000 via USB. Period. Why? Who knows! It's Windows ME. Say no more...

I was lucky enough to be able to borrow an IBM ThinkPad T21 with Windows 2000 on it. ProntoEdit and its communications to the TSU 3000 via USB worked just fine on that machine. I was also able to try ProntoEdit and the TSU 3000 USB connection on another HP Pavilion PC running Windows XP Home Edition with ZERO problems.

And just to get this off my chest, being a died in the wool Mac guy (since 1984), even my Mac (a 17" PowerBook) at least recognized the Pronto remote as a Pronto remote(!) when I plugged it into the Mac's USB port!

So, my solution to this incompatibility problem was to upgrade my PC with Windows XP Home Edition with service pack 2 ($89,99 at CompUSA for the "upgrade" version). Well, make that completely reformat and install XP Home Edition from scratch just to make absolutely sure there was no hold over of anything from Windows ME on the hard drive.

And guess what? The USB interface works just fine now even on my HP Pavilion PC! XP even recognized the Pronto as a "Pronto Remote" when I plugged it in, even before installing ProntoEdit.

I suppose I should count myself lucky in that my PC (a family hand me down when that person went back to a Mac) is used for two, and only two things: Connection to my Pronto (via USB) and a Garmin GPS V GPS unit (via serial). Therefore, completely reformatting the hard drive and installing XP and ProntoEdit from scratch was not a problem.

Did I mention I'm a Mac guy? :) Now if Philips and Garmin would only port their apps to MacOS X, I'd be a really happy guy!

The TSU3000 will work under Windows ME. You just have to be lucky enough to have everything click right for you.

XP has solved many of the USB problems and is a very stable operating system. It still amazes me that with all the different brands of computers, motherboards, drives, memory and software that XP works reliably with most things that you throw at it.