Practicing a 720

Tonight I spent some more time playing with the Harmony Remote. A nice touch I noticed (cuz I don’t RTFM until I F’n Have To) is a tilt sensor in the device so if you touch it, it kicks on the backlight so you can see it in the dark.

Played with setting up my favorite channels and added some channel icons. This just sends the channel numbers to the screen 8-4-7 (select), kinda slowly, but I think you can adjust the delay.

Also started changing the screens for my audio receiver, which came pre-loaded with 18 screens of 6 options. On my first screen in the device, I wanted to setup the audio inputs (Replay, DVD, SAT2, iTunes). Since you control the naming, I can easily map Replay to InputDvd/Ld. With my other remote I had to know the source was #4, but there was a little TV label underneath it. iTunes is an Airport Express feed but haven’t figured out which command triggers it. The receiver thinks it should be InputTape, but the Harmony triggers the feed from my other satellite box. There are only 30+ Inputs to pick from so this could take some trial and error.

I also tweaked my Replay controls so the arrows will also trigger Replay (7 sec back) and Advance (30sec skip). Digging around I noticed that in a Device mode you can specify which buttons send which commands to any device. My other remote locked sound control to receiver, but Harmony takes it to another level.

Never thought so much about how I would like to control my TV. Plus realize now that I have something to compare, how worn out my other remote is. Note to self: Please change everything all the time to keep a fresh perspective.

Progamming a remote control that you have to reboot once you upload your changes. What do full-on non-technical people do? I wonder if anyone one has some freaky version of linux and apache running ruby-on-rails over IR on this thing yet. Harmony won’t support Bose gear since the RF is Z-Wave, but if I can convert my Bose to IR, it might.

Bomp bomp bomp bomp. I <3 techno.