Acoustic Research XSight Remote - Page 8

HERE's a brief comparison I did a few years ago. I've owned both, and for the money, Xsight is a very good alternative to harmony. And if you have DirecTV, it's a no-brainer. Don't read too much into the fact that I sold mine. It worked very well, but not as well as my JP1 remotes. Harmony doesn't work as well as my JP1 remotes either, but the family prefers harmony. The software for both harmony and xsight sucks, but both can be made to work after trudging through the clunky software.

Not sure how long it has been available, but there is now a new version of the firmware on the ez-rc site that allows the "Assist" button to be turned off for an activity. The setting is via a checkbox on the key setup screen (right below where the extended keys are configured).

Activities and devices can now be reordered also (not sure if that is new).

What about the order of buttons, can those be rearranged now too?

Thanks

To some extent. You can rearrange extended keys within a particular page, but not between pages (unless you delete a key, then it shifts the keys from the next page).

Alrighty! Got the new update and re-arranged some Devices. Nice!

Noticed that now some device buttons have an icon on them. I have 9 devices but only one device on each page has an icon? Can't find anywhere to assign/change the device button icon??? Would like to either turn them off or have an icon for every device button???

does anyone know if its possible to configure the device address for a device? eg 2 tvs in same room with same brand and I want to configure them separately in remote so that buttons only apply to one device. I can set up the tvs themselves with different device addresses (1 and 2) but remote seems to be only one address.

You have to learn all the address 2 commands from the original remote. Most universals work this way (except JP1 remotes and to a lesser extent harmony).

There is no easy way to change the device icons, which as far as I can tell, only shown on the web site?

I have been able to do it in a roundabout way. Did you originally configure the devices on your remote or using the site? Are the device configs "learned" or a preset code?

Actually you can if you know the individual advanced codes (if they exist in the UEC database) for the TV remote address. If only one code is available for the same brand TV, then you'll need to teach/learn the second setup, but you can use the code for the first.

BTW--just FYI, but Amazon has a great price on brand new ones today. At the current price, the comparable Harmony seems rather limited by comparison.

And it looks like people have been giving it good reviews the last few months.

What's the secret to assigning advanced codes? Does 994 work?

What is your roundabout way?

The icons show on the remote.

I configured every device on the website, and a few with learned buttons.

The ones that have icons-
1. Dish Network DVR- used a code and then changed some buttons
2. Comcast- did not use a code, learned buttons
3. Plasma Tv- used a code and then changed some buttons

So there seems to be no reason why one device has an icon, while another does not.

When adding a device, the web site lists all the brands. There's a check box at the bottom of the brands list that says something to the effect of "not listed." If you select that, it should go to a screen that allows you to enter an "advanced code."

I'm doing this from memory since I don't have the remote at work. I find it absolutely stooooooopid that you can't edit the configuration stored on the web site without plugging in the remote to the USB.

If the device is a "learned" device, you can "re-assign" the icon by:
1. Make sure you have the latest config uploaded to the remote.
2. Logout of the site.
3. Log back in, but instead of "editing the config stored on the web site," select "upload an existing config from the remote to the web site"
4. After the setup from the remote gets uploaded to the web site, it will display a page with all the devices. On this page, any "learned" device will allow you to change the "type" of device--which also changes the icon.

Let me know if it works for you.

Thanks. I thought by "advanced code" you meant EFC which would be the code for an individual function, not simply an unlisted device setup code. I guess there's still no way add an individual function code. In the past I've input EFC's into another one-for-all remote and taught them to my Xsight.

Are you saying changing an icon can only be done if adding a new device? Cause if I try this for an existing device it doesn't let me enter an advanced code.



Ok, this does change the icon shown on the website. But even after downloading it back to the remote there is still no icon at all on the remote's button.

I think people had unreasonably high expectations in the beginning; due in part to the AR marketing hyperbole. Daniel Tonks' review hit the nail on the head. This is a capable remote hampered by a $250 list price that is out of reach for the average consumer, yet based on cloud-based software meant to this very same crowd.

There are many limitations and challenges with browser-based software. So I'm not surprised at the "merely acceptable" design of the ez-rc "wizards." Who decided that to edit a key on a device, you have to use the advanced menu (where the macros are) instead of the device menu? Brilliant! NOT!

No doubt, there are other knuckle-headed design limitations that I believe are not hardware limitations. For instance, while you can control various DirecTV boxes via IR, you can't using a combination of RF/IR or in more than one in RF mode. Also, why have a home button that only useful for displaying the three fixed hard buttons below? Doh! Why not then allow for customization of the hard buttons (other than the Home button)? No reason for all of this other than poor software design.

Some limitations can be worked around by having "dummy duplicate" devices, but they didn't think of adding a simple option to hide the devices in the device list view? Why can't macros be assigned to the device buttons instead of being available only in Activities mode? Why do macros have to be mapped to a device hard/soft button, which means the macros get deleted when you change/delete the device (workaround: create a device that simply holds all the macros)? Why not design a long-hold on the activity list to get to a specific activity screen while disabling the activity macro? Why isn't there a way to print out the function/code list for any given device?

The number of hard keys is quite comprehensive and the layout is really nice. I would have preferred a fake brushed or rubberized finished rather than the finger oil magnet of shiny smooth black plastic. The directional ring could have been just slightly bigger. Keys are all nicely backlit (except for the four color buttons, which are edgelit), and the tactile feedback is very good although durability is unknown.

Despite all the XSight's software and design problems, it's quite capable at it's current price point of about a fifth of it's original MSRP (at least on Amazon). I dare say that it beats any similarly priced Harmony quite handily. Probably not something I'd use for a really complicated setup though.

My memory is foggy--I don't think I've seen any icons on the devices list. Only on the home and activities list. I'll check when I get home tonight.

Sorry about the confusion. There is no way to assign an individual function code--only device codes.

BTW, is there an easy way to "adjust" a learned button, or re-learn a button on the ez-rc site? Seems to me the only way to do this is to do it on the remote and then re-upload and overwrite the web side config.

Huge sale on this remote at the Big River. Pick up a spare.

Exactly, plus the $99 for the RF adapter. That should have come with the remote.

True, but thats a limitation of the DirecTV receiver.

Speaking of macros, how many button presses can you have in each macro?

And many outputs on the RF adapter?

Thanks

Thanks sdolen! At $55 that's one of the best deals I've ever seen on this remote (which is comparable to a $300 harmony 900). I just picked up one myself (hope the third time's a charm).

To answer a few other questions, the RF base is currently $56 at the same place and routinely about $15 on ebay. It has 6 emitters IIRC, and the base is also a blaster. I haven't hit the limit on macro steps yet (my longest is about 20), but it's way more than the 5 steps you get on harmony.

Yes--that's what I was alluding to in my earlier post. I had picked it up last week and found on Sunday night that the price dropped another $15. I posted it on slickdeals and got the attention of some Harmony fanboi's who proceeded to hammer the AR.



I would agree at $250. Not at the current price though.



Actually, that's a limitation of the remote.

What I mean here is that if you have two or more DirecTV receivers, and you set one of them to RF and the others to IR, you would expect the AR to be able to control the one in RF and the rest with IR. But for some software limitation, from what I understand, the remote once set to control DirecTV via RF won't send IR to the other DirecTV boxes via IR.

This was what I gathered from dbstalk forums. But even then, I think one could work around the problem by setting the AR to control the one DirecTV receiver via RF, then teach it the other DTV receivers IR instead of picking a DirecTV code via the software. But I could be wrong.




I don't have more than a dozen or so. But as mdavej points out, there is no limit!

I don't really need the RF base in my secondary setup. But I was tracking the prices on Fleabay for the RF when I was researching the remote last week, and they go from $20 to $50 there. I picked up one, but it's not here yet. Don't forget to look also for the Nevo equivalent--the REX-433; which is what I bought.

BTW--thanx so much mdavej for your posts. It was your reasoned postings here and on dbstalk (as well as Daniel Tonks' review) that convinced me I should give the AR a try at the bargain price.

Just speculating here, but if UEI decides to completely discontinue the C3/C2/XSight, I hope they will at least release an API. Give the open source community a crack at the remote, and I think it could rattle the Logicrap dominance in this arena. I say Logicrap, but I still love a lot of their stuff--especially their mice, keyboards and Squeezebox!

I checked my config last night, and sure enough, 3 out of the 11 devices I had on mine didn't show an icon on the remote. On 1 of the 3, I think the title may be too long, but the other two instances are really strange. Bet it's a bug--the icons show on the web config, just not on the remote as you've pointed out.

Maybe we should call AR tech support to complain and have them log it as a bug--hopefully to be fixed.

The funny thing is, I never had any icons on my remote device buttons until I updated to this latest version software a few days ago! I had updated it when I first got it/set it up a few weeks ago. But no icons on the remote until this latest software update.

Where's a link to this $55 sale??

Yeah--I never knew what the old version looked like. When I first connected it on Friday last week, it updated the firmware.

As for the sale, just go to the appropriate "Big Jungle" site and search for the ARRX18G as I'm not so sure we are supposed to post direct links to a retailer? If you meant slickdeals, here's the post: http://goo.gl/w1mp3

I see what you're saying now.

Thank you for answering all of my questions.

Son of gun, the price went up to $83.81 now

maybe due to a sudden run on the supply?
Frys is still selling it at around $70