I would really love to be able to make my Pace 551 HD box send a power and record command to my DVR. I have an IR Blaster or "VCR Commander" for the digital box and wonder if anyone has ever successfully gotten it to work. I dont think it's compatible with the pioneer DVR 650H cos I sat there for like half an hour trying to get it to send a power and record command to it.

I replied to your first post based on my memory of the old Pioneer VCRs, but deleted my reply after doing some casual experimenting with various remote protocols. The problem with the Pioneer vcrs is that while they were mfrd by big-name vcr companies, the remote codes were not the same as those used by those companies own VCRs. I can't remember now who made the two Pioneer VCRs (VH-900 and VH-930SD) sold here in North America but it was almost certainly JVC, NEC or Hitachi. All of the then-popular audio brands contracted with one of these three to get a hifi vhs deck on the market: Sansui, Yamaha, Teac, DBX and Marantz etc all went this OEM route as did Pioneer. The sticking point is Pioneer apparently requested their own custom remote control codes, and those codes have been carried over to their current DVD recorders.

If you received a printout of code numbers with your Pace box, you could try the ones listed for JVC, Hitachi and NEC vcrs. I have tried this with my Sony universal remote with no success, but it may be the code list that came with it has errors (they often do). You may simply have to grit your teeth and get used to setting the timer on both your cable box and your DVD recorder: the majority of us eventually learn to cope with it. The Pio 650 timer screen is relatively simple to set, and need only be set once for recurring shows like weekly TV series.

Most DVD recorder brands did NOT carry over their VCR remote control codes, so its not like your Pioneer is lame: if you do finally discover what code will run it, its actually one of the few that can be used this way. So if you don't find the right code, and just can't handle setting the two timers, changing to another brand DVD recorder won't help you. Your only option would be upgrading your cable box to one that has its own built-in hard drive recorder: these have point and click timeshifting and anything you want to keep permanently can be played from the box into your Pioneer recorder. The disadvantage is the extra time required to dub from decoder box to DVD recorder "after-the-fact", but many here in the states prefer this workflow to setting two separate timers. Since I record a LOT of stuff I want to keep and do very little disposable timeshifting, this method takes up too much of my time so I prefer to just set the separate timers. Its annoying but after you get used to it it becomes second nature, I'd long been doing it with my VCRs anyway.

Thanks for replying. I will see if I can find the book that came with the Pace box. If it's no where to be found, I'll try looking online for the manufacturer's codes you mentioned. I did have success in making my Logitech Harmony remote control the Pioneer DVR 650H so that gave me a little hope in thinking it might work with the IR coming from the Pace box. If all else fails, I'll probably do the double timer thing because the HD PVR available here with Rogers cable is way too expensive and doesn't hold a lot of programming. Once again, that's for the valuable info! It seems like I've just reached the stumbling block that you and many others have reached ages ago :)

Assuming your Pio can be set to begin recording when it gets an input from one particular line input, you may have a workaround. Is your Pace box with two tuners? If so, program anything, just say 5 minutes, 30 minutes, what ever is easiest, to start one minute before the program you really want to record on your Pio. Then program what you really want, to start one minute after the other recording. That way, your Pio will start a minute early, and when the second recording starts on your Pace box, it will be on the tuner displayed/outputted. Just be sure to turn your Pace box off, and be sure it doesn't put out a signal when turned off.

Yeh it can be set to "Auto record" though I found that feature a little useless because my Pace box is always on. I'm pretty sure it only has 1 tuner too. What i'm doing now is just setting two timers for recording. One on the Pace and one on the Pio. Seems to work OK even though it would be nice to have a TVGOS or something on the Pio, the timer interface is pretty simple.