Hi Mathew -- we don't have a 950 yet. The question to 950 owners: Does your (non-technical non-audiophile) spouse love, like, get-along, tolerate, hate, operating the 950.
Thx

because I'm not convinced the FCC knows anything about god 
Dead on, it was in their interview together, and it was the FCC (my memory!). I was encouraged by THAT Pres. making that remark hoping it would make him a little more lenient minded when the FCC is asked to craft rulings which might impact fair use for pers. Copies.!

Mr. D, I have decided I’m might be a bit of an oddity, and I’m the ‘other spouse’ who took over, SO I don’t know how to rate for ease (if I had been my old self). The husband has ingrained knowledge when he bothers to apply it. I was boggled by trying to route my mothers Cable (A&B) and Satellite and OTA antenna wire enabling a VHS to record. He had to help me figure it out, since we had only 2 RF Coaxial inputs, open to route the 4 lines.

All the males here (I’m surrounded) get along with the 950, and because I have not done my job, the 950 remote is queued to only do about 90% of the HT functions. So we have a potential to have to deal with 3 remotes regularly. They (and their friends) have managed to que up the sound and a DVD and muck with the Sat. without input from me. Only occasionally do I have to get them out of a bind.
Before I started changing out display, STB’s etc. requiring new remote programming I have not had the time for, -I had the 950 and everything else on an old Sony Commander LCD remote which I programmed over a weekend. After about a week or two they all learned how to run the basic system. (and figured out how to run up the SW etc….a few things I wish they had not!.
Its nice to have a plan in place. Let me know if the calabration makes a diffrence!

I don't think the issue is the usability of the 950, as I don't think it's much different from other AV sources. It's the usability of any AV setup that combines multiple inputs and routes to multiple outputs that usually causes grief. This is why my original response was focused on a universal remote with macros; get rid of the multiple remotes and eight button presses to change modes, and suddenly the world is good again.

--Mike


[This message has been edited by Llamas (edited March 05, 2003).]

I think that the most confusing thing about the 950, isn't the 950, but the remote.

"Honey?" "Yes, dear." "Why doesn't the power button turn the 950 on?" (Sorry, couldn't resist...)

I will kiss the man that invents a remote that:

Intuitively senses what I want it to do this time as opposed to what I wanted it to do last time.

Went to eject the disc out of the Panny 91 on my way out the door. Normally a nicety loading the deck automatically powers up the player. But I had just shut the whole system, down with the remote. Then....walked over to eject the disc to take it with me.....sigh....it powered back on.

Sounds like the DWIM 3912 univeral remote...

--Mike

"Disk And Execution Monitor"? A program that is not invoked explicitly but lies dormant waiting for some condition(s) to occur or “Damn Warren's Infernal Machine” ??

I was going to say, "Do What I Mean", but yours is better.

I've been looking at the harmony remote.
It allows the user to select an activity
such as "watch TV", "Play DVD", etc.
The remote will configure itself such
that the volume, channel selection etc.
will be directed to the correct piece of
equipment.

For instance in my setup, I use the VCR
as the TV tuner and of course the 950 for
sound. The Harmony remote can be configured
to make this all transparent. No need to
switch between devices like most other remotes.


Looks pretty easy for anybody to pick
up and use once it has been set up.

Take a look at the review at http://www.remotecentral.com
There's also a harmony forum on the same
site.


Bill

I've already ordered the MX500. However, I got to admit the Harmony SST768 is quite appealing. The activity centered approach is very attractive to me and would be to my spouse also. I also like the fact that it's programmable using a website and uses an XML database structure. And it's not terribly big. I am looking at the size of the MX500 -- it's huge! I may have to get both and evaluate them.