New remote control

I bought a new remote control online last week. It is a Philips SRU4105WM/17, and I got it for $10, which is a steal.

The draw of the thing was supposed to be it's ability to learn codes, just by pressing the 'channel up' button. Our DVR has resisted efforts to find and/or set the remote code to use another remote. Same for the DVD player. I figured that even if I could get rid of 3 of the 4 remotes, it would be worth it.

The remote came today, I went right to work trying to get it going. The TV was hooked in within 30 seconds. (Not sure if every function is there for the TV, but we don't change the settings all that often, so it should be fine. It looks to be fully functional.) VCR - another 30 seconds. DVD player - about 2 minutes, but it did work. 3 out of 4. Sweet.

DVR. Ah, the DVR. The DVR resisted all efforts to automatically learn the code. It just sat there and stared at me, dumb as a brick. I tried a number of times, no luck. This remote lets you line 2 up together and teach the new one what the old one did. I taught it channel up. That worked. When you have the thing recorded, you can check to see what remote code it thinks it has. (Press the button and wait for it to blink. Like someone who has been paralyzed on TV...) The code for the DVR is 0565. I cleared the setting I put on, and tried setting the remote by code. The code took, and appeared successful, but still didn't work right.

Went back online to figure out what in the world was going on. Turns out the DVR is from Switzerland. (ADB) Maybe the DVR doesn't let thing talk to it because the remotes speak English, and the DVR speaks French, German, or Italian.

Back to just teaching the remote one button at a time. There are 33 buttons I want programmed from the old remote to the new remote. I got it done the first time, it seemed to work, but the '1' always pressed twice. The next time, the '1', the '2', and the channel up always pressed twice. Crazy thing. I tried it one more time, and both the fast forward, rewind, '1', and 'Guide' buttons all pressed multiple times.

The 'other' John, from work, bought the same remote, his came 2 days ago. I called him and explained it, this crazy double press thing happened to him, too. He said he had to start just tapping when doing it to get it to work. Ok, I can do that, I got a pencil out, and started pressing the remotes with the eraser. Try one this way did everything right but the right menu button, channel up, fast forward, and rewind. Try two made it so everything worked right except the right menu button.

I got frustrated and typed this blog entry to this point. Then I loaded the dishwasher, started a load of laundry, and checked on the girls, who were all too quiet, even for 9pm.

Next try - The '2', 'Fast forward', 'rewind', and 'pause' are all double hitting.

Another try - about 10 of the buttons double hit. Wishing I had kept the recording where the right menu button was the only one misbehaving...

Tried again, went to do the buttons really fast. Half the buttons double hit, half the buttons didn't work.

I am a glutton for punishment. 4 buttons double hitting.

Last try. No good. I will have to save it for some other day. The remote has 10 buttons that you can record keystrokes, so you can set them to go to whatever channel you want. They also sent a sheet of stickers with something like 200 channel stickers for it. If I can get the DVR working right, I can program the channels we watch the most. But not tonight. I could program channels 11 and 33, but not 21 or 23...