Official Logitech Harmony 900 thread - Page 16

Has anyone had any problems with the mini-blasters? My SA Explorer 8300HD does not work if anything is within 3 inches of the blaster. I noticed that it would not work with the door closed on my Salamander Designs cabinet. With the door open I tested while slowly moving closer to the mini-blaster and if my hand get anywhere near it, it does not work at all. I tried other items like cardboard or a book and the same effect.

Even the devices I can get working are really finicky. To the point where I have to adjust within millimeters to get it working and the slightest movement with cause it to stop functioning. I can't imagine how you could position one to get two devices like the show in the setup poster.

I have the Harmony 890 and there is a slight lag when using the remote with RF. Is this the case with the 900? Is the lag improved at all?

Well what was the RF protocol they moved to with the 900? Whatever it is, it sound like it's range is no better than z-wave.
Doesn't seem too smart if they've moved to a protocol that is less ubiquitous...

Are there not dimmer switches that support this RF protocol so one doesn't have to use it's IR blasters?

I've never understood why they don't just move to 802.11n 2.4Ghz...
Remotes could behave as a client of an existing AP & users can plug various adapters (e.g. IR blasters) into it, or one could get a dedicated remote AP/adapter.
Guess the profit margin isn't as good...

One would hope if there were beta testers in Australia that this mean it's coming here, but that's no guarantee.
I will check out that Logitech blog post again...

jalyst, as far as I know it's now on the ECNet rf protocol that operates on te 2.4ghz frequency
and again, we were told that this new protocol would allow them to bring the remote to Australia, so one would imagine that they will

Found out it uses EC-Net (2.4Ghz) but as yet haven't found much on it...
Being 2.4Ghz-based does change everything in-terms of usage here in Oz.
Can say quite confidently that it would be allowed here now...

***Woops you beat me to it WA!*** ;-)

i have a mini sitting at the base of my blu-ray player with a sa explorer 8240hd on top of that device. the front of the 8240 is recessed a little from the blu-ray player's front and the blaster handles commands to both devices with no problem, even when the blaster gets shifted off center. this is in an open shelf cabinet.
i'm not sure why you're having problems, but one thing is to make sure the lead-wire side of the mini blasters are facing the back of the cabinet. if you already have it set up that way then it may be a bad blaster set. the only device i have that's finicky is my xbox360, but i don't have any of the proximity problems you're describing.

WA - not sure I 100% agree with you. Could there not be similar interference (as we are experiencing with the One now) when the RF signal is converted to IR at the 900's receiver and sent to the blasters (main or mini)?

The reason I ask is that, when the cable box is not responding to IR commands for those first few minutes, I can open the cabinet door, put the One within inches of the cable box IR sensor, and the cable box still does not operate. Does the LCD TV emit higher amounts of IR when first turned on, then slowly reduces IR output as it warms up?

I'm not sure if the stray IR signals are coming from the TV directly to the cable box, or possibly a path via TV-Xantech receiver-cable box emitter...or a combination of both. Just strange that all other A/V equipment operates just fine during the first few minutes. I guess I could unplug the Xantech unit and test the system with the cabinet doors open to see if the Xantech system might be the culprit. I could test the same with the overhead CFLs turned off. I might also consider switching out the 283M blink transmitter for the 282D non-blink transmitter.

Just trying to fully understand all possibilities of what is not working properly today, and what might not work properly tomorrow (ie, potential 900 purchase). I'd rather not shell out a few hundred bucks for no performance gains.

WA - to be clear, I do appreciate your reply to my post. Just don't take any offense that I'm still trying to figure this out 100%... And I'll appreciate any other info you think would be helpful.

seems like you clarified things a bit more...I the box can't receive commands directly from the original remotes inches from the receiver in the box when the tv has just turned on then yeah, it's going to behave the same way
I thought from your first post that the interference was only when going through the ir extender setup
2 suggestions
1. does your box have an "ir in" Jack in the back?
2. sounds like your tv panel is causing excessive ir interference and I would talk to that company about replacing it with a new panel

If your Comcast Motorola box was anything like mine then I would place the blame on it. They have a problem of locking out IR commands and then after a period of time it will respond to the commands plus all the ones that you hit before you realized it was locked. Those boxes are junk.

The Motorola boxes have IR jacks on the back, but you can't use them for a direct IR connection from an RF blaster/extender.

WA - glad the add'l info was useful to both you and bryan. My Moto cable box (DCH3200/3385/000) does not have an IR input on the back panel that I can see, as I just looked at some pix I took when I rewired/switched gear in the family room back in April.

The amount/timing of IR interference described by me is just that - my assumption of what could be happening.

I was not aware of any "lock-out" period as mentioned by bryan, so not sure how to verify if that's happening. Though the cable box doesn't appear to remember all the previous commands, it just eventually begins to receive just the current commands, such as direct station input via the remotes icons (squareeyes), channel up/down, etc. I wonder if I changed the order of when devices are powered up, would that help? I'm thinking not.

Oh well, your replies have got my thinking of how to thoroughly troubleshoot this issue. I think I'll first try unplugging the Xantech first to see if that solves the problem, and go from there...

But for now, I will hold off on buying a 900...my wallet thanks you!

So what's the lowest price that anyone has paid online for a new Harmony 900? I googled it and found for $312 at this site http://www.getyourtech.com/servlet/t...ony-900/Detail but the 900 and most of the products I added to the cart are out of stock. So, I don't know if they're a reputable outlet and I could not find out how much they would charge for shipping it. Amazon has already lowered the price to $356.97 with free shipping.

if you have another harmony then call logitech and tell them the screen is bad - you will be able to get the 900 for 199 direct from logitech

I got it for about $330 on ebay through a reputable power seller. If you search through Bing.com, you can get 8% cash back on the ebay purchase which nets a price of about $300. I've had no issues with the remote, other than entirely ridiculous range of the RF.

I have one of my mini blasters right under the ir sensor area of my 8300HD with a 100% success rate. It's also an open stand with the only obstacle being a footboard about 4ft away.

Quick question, I have only one connection between my AVR and LCD TV, is there some way to have the Harmony NOT switch inputs on the TV each time I switch activities?

I've created all my activities using the manual option. For each activity that uses the display, I specify the correct HDMI input. For me it's always Input 4. If the Harmony is issuing an input command it's always the same input.

mine is setup the same way, as far as the harmony issuing an input command or not, that depends on your tvs input selection method
if you've setup all your activities to use the same input and absolutely don't want the tv to get an input command, change the tv input selection method to #1 (input scrolling)
the logic that method 1 uses will realize that no commands are needed
if your tv uses method 2 (discrete commands) the logic the harmony uses is to always send the discrete command at the start of the activity
keep in mind that true discrete commands will have no I'll effect

This is what I needed, thanks much!

glad to have helped

Waiting for the big brown truck to arrive with my Harmony 900 from Amazon. I'll be interested in seeing how this compares to my URC MX 880. I need the RF for some equipment in my cabinet that the MX has a problem getting to. i really like the MX but I do own other Harmony remotes in other bedrooms and they all work great. Plus with the Harmony data base I can finally control my Panasonic SV-3800 DAT (lost that remote in a move or two ago).

Do blasters have to be in front of and pointed towards components? If components are in an enclosed cabinet how would IR Blasters work.

Does remote also put out IR signal to work TV which is hanging on wall in plain sight.

Thanks

yes the remote sends ir as well...on the remote itself you can assign each device to be controlled via the blaster or the remote itself

as far as blaster placement goes, they're pretty strong so they don't have to be facing the devices...best advice is to just play around with placement
if the cabinet is closed, the ir will bounce around inside the cabinet

Ok thanks

Where can you purchase additional mini-blasters?

I sort of asked before, but I never got an answer. Is there a profile for the 900 remote to control a RF Vudu box? In other words, can the 900 control the Vudu directly using RF or do I have to get an IR adapter for the Vudu box?

additional blasters and miniblasters are not yet on sale, hopefully they will be soon

any harmony remote with "rf" can really only send rf to it's own blaster/extender (890 can also control some zwave devices)
proprietary rf licenses cost too much, so you'll probably never see a universal that can control proprietary rf device signals

so yup, you'll need an ir adapter for your vudu box

You will also need this and this.

http://www.radioshack.com/product/in...ductId=2062457

http://www.radioshack.com/product/in...ductId=2102953

Thanks for the info!

to clarify, I don't know if they will sell just the miniblasters separately or not
I have 4 miniblasters from my two main blasters that I'm not using
send me a pm regarding them

if you're just going to add more miniblasters you would need a mono splitter that allows you to plug in a 2.5mm jack...that spliiter looks like it would take a 3.5mm Jack, which is what the old blaster tip cables used