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Screen advancements.
The SRC-3810’s LCD screen is divided into 21 touchscreen buttons (or “squares”, also known as “soft keys”) in a 3 columns by 7 rows grid. Each square is about 0.45” by 0.40” (1.1cm by 1.0cm), just large enough for a fingertip. The type of LCD used on the SRC-3810 and SRC-8000 is called “iconic”, meaning that all labels are preset at the factory and cannot be changed. This is in contrast to a “graphical dot matrix” screen, as used on remotes like the Pronto, where all screen elements are drawn with tiny customizable pixels. Although each LCD square on the SRC-3810 can display one of several preset labels that change depending on the active device, the actual characters making up those labels cannot be modified or moved to other squares. More on LCD customization later.
What’s new on the SRC-3810 is a dot matrix text region at the top of the screen, comprising 2 lines with 9 characters each. This area is used to display a customizable name for each device, the current date and time, plus the setup menu system. This is a huge improvement over the SRC-8000 which had nowhere to display context-based menu settings or instructions, and had to make do with finding something “close” on one of the LCD-based keys.
A bluer shade of blue.
The LCD display as well as all hard buttons beneath the screen are backlit with blue LEDs. This is unusual, since generally electroluminescent (EL) panels are preferred for their power efficiency and smooth illumination. Although the bottom edge of the screen is a bit brighter than the rest, the LEDs are certainly brighter and a more intense shade of blue than the “aqua” blue EL panel used on the previous SRC-8000.
Indeed, the SRC-3810 does a far better job at keeping the LED backlighting consistent over the entire remote than I’ve seen from other similarly illuminated controls, such as the Proton iR800 (which bears more than a passing resemblance to other Sunwave products – see our review). One benefit to LED technology is that its control circuitry is silent, while EL panels require a voltage boosting transformer that generates an audible buzzing sound – some more annoying than others.
The oh-so-pleasantly bright backlighting can be activated manually with the [Backlight] hard button or automatically via the ambient light sensor which can be set to one of 15 different sensitivity levels – “1” being the least sensitive and “15” the most sensitive. Adjustments to the sensitivity scale are done live, so it’s possible to see instantly how a particular setting will interact with your current light level. Configuring the sensor to “0” will disable it and force manual control via the [Backlight] hard button, while setting it to “16” will force the backlight always on. The backlight can be set to automatically shut off after 1 through 60 seconds of inactivity, or can be completely disabled for better battery life (and/or anyone who can see in the dark).
The LCD, on the other hand, can be set to turn off after 1 through 90 minutes of inactivity. Since LCDs are very power efficient (some remotes leave them on perpetually), setting a long timeout on the SRC-3810 will not have as overly adverse affect on battery life (which is officially rated at 3 to 6 months). An inactive remote can be activated by tapping the screen or pressing [Backlight], [Channel Up], [Volume Up] or [Power]. Curiously, no other hard buttons will work – even the device buttons won’t awaken the remote. Pressing [Backlight] to switch on the screen will not initially activate the backlighting unless the sensor deems it necessary, and pressing the other three hard buttons will not transmit the attached command until the second press.
Although the screen’s reflective backing is slightly darker than the SRC-8000, the contrast ratio is still very good (but cannot be adjusted). The main improvement to readability is with the on-screen elements: thicker outlines and heavier text make everything easier to see in dimmer lighting.
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