|
...Continued from Page 12.
Label & page editing.
The next item on the Setup Menu is “Edit”. Two sub-options edit device or button names and hide or enable entire pages of commands. A total of 40 custom labelled functions can be added to each device on the URC-200 or URC-300, and the name of each device can be tailored to suit. To change a device’s name, keep hitting “Page Up” on the screen where devices are initially selected until the top line changes from “EDIT” to “MAIN”, then select the one to edit.
Labels are edited with the number keys, which turn into a telephone style typewriter – although here “A,B,C” starts on the [1] key the continues three letters to a key until [9]. The [0] key holds several remote-related icons and special symbols, in total there are 56 possible characters. The cursor is positioned left or right with the arrow keys, and characters are deleted by pressing [Down].
Unlike the MX-500, unused pages on the URC-200 and URC-300 can be hidden from view. By default all devices on the URC-200 have 5 visible pages, whether needed or not. Up to 8 can be enabled if desired, or you could hide all but 1. The URC-300 has similar capabilities and initially displays 4 pages, with up to 5 available. Although visible pages do not need to be sequentially numbered, holes are not accounted for. So if everything except for pages 1 and 8 are hidden, the remote will display “1 of 8” at the bottom and then jump to “8 of 8”.
A melange of macros.
The URC-200 and URC-300 support an astonishing number of macros – over 400 for the Automator and over 600 for the Customizer. Macros can be attached to any device, placed on the two “power” hard buttons, or recorded on any of the in-device LCD keys. Each of these macros can have up to 190 steps, more than enough for any task. During recording the bottom line of the LCD keeps constant track of how many steps have been entered. Changing devices counts as a step, and 0.5 second delays can be added between steps by pressing the [Pause] button.
Each device can have a device switching macro, which is typically used to keep a system’s power and inputs in complete sync with the remote via discrete codes (discrete codes are commands that do only one thing, such as turn a device “on” but not “off”). Hold times can be added so that a macro will only transmit after the button has been held for so many seconds. This is useful for those times when you want to change devices in the remote, but not affect anything on the system. To do this, macros are started with a delay – for a one second hold delay press [Pause] twice followed by the macro’s steps.
Macro-only commands (such as discrete power codes – not often included in the database) can be situated on hidden pages, but those pages must be visible at least for recording. Pressing the [Light] button during recording brings up a handy menu with three options: “Save” (stores the current macro), “Undo” (deletes the last entered step) and “Exit” (leaves without saving).
| 
Previous page
