Hi,

Just about to buy a universal remote and I have to say I am a bit scared given all of the criticisms of the ease of use of these things (Being a non Techie)

I have narrowed things down to two (Mosiac and the Pronto 1000 - the one without the base station) and am wondering if anyone can help answer a few questions on which one to go for.

1) I am guessing that if the thing supports the IR Codes of your existing remotes it makes things a lot easier? You just kind of point the two things at each other and off you go.

2) to this end I hear that the Mosiac has a bigger data base than the Pronto for this sort of thing?

I am after a remote to program a.......

Scientific Atlanta Cable box
Panasonic TX32PH40 TV
Panasonic V10EBS DVD
Panasonic NV-HS830BS Video

TV, DVD and Video all current/new Panasonic kit.

3) WHat the hell do the codes after the Brand name in the Brand data base mean, they do not seem to correlate to any brand numbers of hardware?

4) Finally on the Cable remote option on my friends Pronto he had downloaded for him all of the logos of the Sky Channels. Can the Mosiac do this and in either case where do you get the logos from?

5) As the Mosiac tends to sell on ease of use (eg uploading stuff over the phone!?) does it also come with software where I can use by PC to do all of the donkey work?

6) On buying one of these things, are there any comercial services where you tell someone what you have and they send you a config which you simply just upload?

Thanks for any help you can give me.

If you plan to buy a Pronto I would post this in the Pronto forum. The Pronto has a huge database of equipment. Take a look.

[Link: remotecentral.com]

First off, as John mentioned, you are in the wrong forum - this is for the ProntoNeo, which is an entirely different model.

The Pronto 1000 has no built-in database, but as you've seen from John's post, you can download IR codes for pretty much any device you want. It's not a big deal to learn from your own original remotes as well. This means you can download codes which would not even be found in a built-in database (such as "discrete" on and off codes, which are very useful in automating your system).

There are no commercial sites which will design your remote for you, but there are individuals and small companies which will. On the other hand, you may find that you enjoy the process enough to do it yourself.

It's your call as to which one to get - but the Pronto is a *far* more established remote and there is a wealth of support and tools available from this site.