I've pretty much got my 810 to a "stable one" position. I've used dsp81's technique to make some very attractive Activities pages. I'm very happy overall with the remote, and the performance with the MRF-350 is way better than my old MX-850/MRF-200 combo. However, I have two main gripes from a usability standpoint that I think could be easily rectified. I'm not a CI and as such have no direct link to URC. Dale, if you you read this I'd appreciate it if you could forward it along. Or, if you're a CI and agree with me, please feel free to forward my ideas along to URC...

First, I think that the help screens should be reconfigured/rewritten. Right now they are wordy and complicated for a neophyte. The buttons on the help screen are labelled with (sometimes) unhelpful device input labels (DVI, COMP1, SVID2, etc.). Here is roughly how I think they should read/function (with the button labels represented by {##})

Screen 1:

Are any of your devices turned off?
{TURN ON TV}
{TURN ON RECEIVER}
{TURN ON CABLE BOX}

Screen 2:
Are any of your devices set to the wrong input?
{FIX TV INPUT}
{FIX RECEIVER INPUT}

Currently there are separate screens for audio and video input help screens. These can be on one screen and can be labelled more generically (since the activity macro specifies the correct input, the end user shouldn't be bothered with pressing a button labelled with the input label).

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Second, the Power On button is completely FUBARed. As far as I can tell, the current functionality of the "ON" hard button is to execute the Activity Macro that is currently assigned to the upper-left LCD button of the Activities page.

This is completely counterintuitive. From a usability point of view, the most commonly used function on any LCD button page is in the lower-right position (assuming a right-handed user) as it is the button that requires the thumb to travel the least distance from the "home" position (around the volume/channel/navpad buttons).

When the user presses the "OFF" hard button, the remote should store the most recently accessed Activity page in a register. Usually this will be the page they;re sitting on when they press the "OFF" button. Then, any subsequent presses of the "ON" hard button should execute the Activity macro that was stored when the "OFF" button was pressed.

My display is a Samsung RP DLP which has a wicked long power on delay. I've tried programming the power on delay for the device and the remote is just not paying any attention to it. So now, I have to rack my brain to remember the last thing I was watching and press that activity button. If I guess wrong, I have to go through the "Help" process outline above...

That's my $.02.

S