Having started this thread with a rant brought on by my connection problems, I feel obligated to report that I did NOT return the remote. I brought it to work, and discovered that it connects just fine on my office computer, which is running the same version of Windows(98)as my home machine. I can't figure out why.
It's a real pain to have to work this way, a temporary solution at best, but at least the thing connects. I managed to successfully download the firmware upgrade, and I have converted the CCF from my 1000.
Now that I've been using the 3000 for a couple of weeks, I'd like to report my impressions:
I still feel that the build quality is inferior to the 1000, but the upside is that it's significantly lighter, making it less likely that I'll drop it.
I know that others feel that the hard button edge/backlighting is a really cool, but I wish more of the light came THROUGH the icons on the buttons.
I love having the hard cursor buttons--they're much easier to use than the soft cursors I had on my 1000. I've also been able to reclaim a good deal of screen space on my device pages. I've managed to get a couple of devices down to one page. But the buttons take a little too much pressure to activate, in my opinion. There's too great a difference between the soft tap on the screen and the strong pressure needed for the hard buttons.
The firmware upgrade has improved IR transmit speed, but it is still much slower than my 1000. Also, page jump speed is stilly PAINFULLY SLOW!! I hope that Philips will address this problem in a future upgrade.
I'm still getting used to the new software. I think the best feature is being able to make multiple changes to multiple buttons without having to close & re-open the properties window--a real time-saver.
I'd be happy to share my somewhat crude, but workable PCF with anyone who would like a peek.
