President, Sell-Through Solutions, Inc.
When the Universal Remote Control (URC) MX-5000 Network Wand was on its way to my home, I was thinking, wow, $1200 for a universal remote control. What could it possibly do to justify its cost? I sat and looked at all the gear that the MX-5000 would soon command. The Pioneer Kuro plasma TV. The Shanling tube CD player. The DIRECTV HD DVR. The PlayStation 3. The Pioneer Elite receiver.
Then it dawned on me. Most of that stuff just sits there in the rack, regarding me impassively with unblinking red and blue LEDs. It had been more than a year since I even touched the DVR.
On the other hand, during any home entertainment session, a good universal remote gets a spirited workout: adjusting settings and navigating menus; recording and playing back shows; channel surfing; skipping commercials and Monday Night Football's dreadful halftime highlights; on-the-fly volume adjustments to allow commentary during bad SyFy channel movies; skipping back to replay all those "what the hell was that" moments from "Fringe;" cranking both guitar solos in "Comfortably Numb;" muting those repulsive Geico commercials with the money and the eyeballs and the maddening song.
A remote in my system has to be tough enough to withstand well over 100 button presses a day, and smart enough to flawlessly engage a complex series of commands (a macro) with a single button push. With more than 28 years in the A/V business, you can imagine the Who's Who of fancy remotes that have paraded through my system. Several years ago, I bought URC's stellar MX-700, then upgraded to the MX-850, and never looked back. Both remotes are hard-button types which, after trying a variety of touchscreen remotes, I strongly prefer. So it was with some trepidation that I considered replacing my beloved MX-850 with the MX-5000, which not only sports a touchscreen interface (mixed with hard buttons), but a touchscreen interface on steroids. The MX-5000 is the first handheld universal remote that features haptic touch feedback: when you touch a button on the smooth glass touchscreen, it actually feels like a button, with a satisfying vibration pushback. The MX-5000 also features:
A big, fully customizable, 320 x 240-pixel brilliant color screen, with fluid, animated page transitions.
Wi-Fi capability for control of companion networked devices, and for accessing Internet info such as weather, news, stocks, and sports.
Complete control and display of iPod functions (with the optional PSX-2 Personal Server).
Native lighting control-just add dimmers and/or switches, and program right from the remote.
2-way Wi-Fi operation and display of Wi-Fi-enabled receivers from Denon, Yamaha, Integra, and more. Control and view AM/FM/Sirius Radio stations, volume, etc. from the MX-5000 screen.
PC Server application that converts any PC with iTunes or Windows Media Player into a music server controllable by the MX-5000, complete with album art and other metadata on the color touchscreen.
The remote ships with no setup software, as URC insists that the device be programmed by a professional System Integrator who has been trained on URC's Complete Control Program (CCP) software. And, rightfully so, because the software has a challenging learning curve. Not for nothing does URC maintain a massive installer training initiative, with professional in-house instructors augmented by a comprehensive training website. I took advantage of all of the above, attending two of URC's excellent, self-paced MX-5000 installer training modules before I even cracked the manual. Once inside the manual, I tried my usual practice of skipping around to the good parts, and quickly discovered that, to make the most of the MX-5000, I would need to read the whole 96-page thing. You read it right, 96 pages. Still want to program this remote yourself?
After playing with the MX-850 software for years, I found that the MX-5000 version ain't your daddy's remote programming software. It does a lot more, simply because the remote itself does a lot more. This is the longest review I've ever written, and it would be twice this long if I provided more than a sideways glance at the bottomless capabilities and customizations of the MX-5000.
Anyone familiar with the Microsoft Office 2007 suite will recognize the CCP software's easy-to-navigate Ribbon interface. You hit the Program tab to start programming (logical!), and the Ribbon steps you through the programming steps sequentially. First, you add all your gear, and it's extremely likely that URC already has all your remote codes in its database. So that step is simple. Then you put all the buttons exactly where you want them, size them, and make them look like anything you wish. The software comes with a ton of beautiful buttons, from hi-res TV station icons, to the logos of all the popular brands of gear, to blank buttons in myriad colors. You can make your own buttons in Photoshop, Microsoft Paint, etc., which I did, because my Photoshop kung fu is strong, and my homemade buttons look badass. And every button label can say whatever you want it to say, in a variety of fonts, font colors, and font sizes. I made all my channel number buttons real big, so my aging eyes won't have to squint.
Of course, the MX-5000 can learn remote commands, in the unlikely event that you have a remote control that isn't in the database. The software also steps you through setting up optional RF control (for controlling equipment beyond the line of sight), and connecting the MX-5000 to your Wi-Fi network. After all that, you program macros. A macro lets the remote perform a slew of commands with a single button push. You could, for example, push a macro button you call "Play Blu-ray": the curtains part, the lighting dims, the screen lowers, the receiver turns on (or switches to Blu-ray), the TV turns on (or switches to the appropriate HDMI input), the Blu-ray player begins to play. You can create macros for All System On and All System Off. You can create macros for pretty much any sequence of commands you can imagine, and assign them to any button you please.
If you're an end-user reading this, you should be thankful that URC only allows the MX-5000 to be programmed by a pro. You may be a genius, but you'd still be messing with this thing three sleepless days later, and one of your friends would have to drive you to the Cuckoo's Nest. Nine out of ten users will be stumped trying to sync the remote to a Vista or Windows 7 computer (there's an easy little tweak that I guarantee you don't know), effectively grounding them before they even get out of the gate. If you're a pro (ostensibly, like me), you may be alarmed that my first complete MX-5000 programming took six hours. But, that was with all the reading and the two online classes, and the additional reading (because I may be just a little dense), and the rookie programming mistakes. I could do the job a second time in less than two hours from scratch, and the third time, maybe 90 minutes. And here's the beauty part: As an installer, you can archive everything-devices, buttons, layouts, etc. So, if I wanted to program another MX-5000 with the same gear, it would take mere minutes. For System Integrators who sell favorite system combos often, this feature is a godsend.
I finally got the MX-5000 programmed, and I'm ready to use it. First, how does $1200 feel in your hand? As Larry David would say: pretty, pretty, pretty good. Actually, amazing. If you've used one of URC's remotes before, you know that this company gets ergonomics in a big way. The MX-5000 gets ergonomics, squared. The whole presentation is very Bang & Olufsen, very Museum of Modern Art Industrial Design Award. The svelte form factor somehow hits the perfect balance between the male and female hand. Thank goodness it's almost impossible to wear the finish off a URC remote, because you'll be fondling this thing a lot.
The hard buttons have a superb feel, and their shapes are nicely differentiated, so you can learn to feel your way around them in a darkened theater, without looking at the remote. Not that finding buttons is gonna be a problem. The display is simply beautiful, and I mean iPhone-beautiful, not remote control-beautiful. The button icon I made for "CD" is a photo of my tube CD player, which is a pretty complex-looking piece of work. On the MX-5000's color touchscreen, you can actually tell what it is! The color touchscreen and the backlit hard buttons "wake up" instantly when you pick up the remote, and time out at a duration of your choosing. The default settings are bright enough that the remote's screen looks like a mini-HDTV when you pick it up, and it's even bright enough to easily see outdoors. Of course, all this color and brightness take a toll on power consumption. My completely-unlit MX-850 could go for months on four AAA batteries. The MX-5000 might get you through two full evenings of entertainment before it needs to go into its charging cradle. You'll just get into the habit of charging it every night, especially when you see how artful it looks, poised in that gloss black cradle.
Each of the hard buttons is brilliantly backlit in classy white light, and they don't use that crude, Pong-looking lettering. These buttons are absolutely hi-res and high-end. The main hard button on the remote ("Select") feels so enticing, I keep thinking up excuses to press it. The lighting, and lighting timeout, for the hard buttons-and for the touchscreen-are fully customizable from the remote (so you don't have to be a pro to do it).
The haptic touchscreen feedback alone is enough to make me kick all other remotes to the curb. It feels so massively cool and provides such satisfying feedback to your commands, you'll even start to think that the vaunted iPod Touch buttons are crude by comparison. For the first time, someone has solved my primary gripe with touchscreens: that you actually know, immediately and without a doubt, when you nailed the button. Of course, it was impossible to solve my secondary gripe with touchscreens: they only look flawless until you touch them. After that, well…more than cats and dogs, more than snakes-humans are just plain greasy creatures. You can wash your hands until sunup, but after just a few minutes of operating a touchscreen, it looks like you first mainlined Kentucky Fried Chicken with a chaser of Orville Redenbacher Movie Theater Butter. So, keep the supplied cleaning cloth nearby.
URC moved the hard buttons around, so my favorites (Guide, Info, Play, Pause, Stop, Skip, Record) don't line up with my old MX-850, and they don't quite line up with remotes from DIRECTV, TiVo, or Dish. Also, to make the remote more petite, you don't get hard buttons for the number keypad anymore. Those go up to a page on the touchscreen. At first, this was all highly frustrating. It reminded me of last month, when I decided, after 11 years, that the fung shui of my office dictated I move my phone from the left side of the desk to the right. For two weeks I swung and missed at the phantom phone on the left. Now, it's second-nature to reach to the right, and I've similarly already gotten used to the new button placements on the MX-5000. And, with the number keypad on the touchscreen, it gives me way more opportunities to play with the intoxicating haptic feedback buttons.
This review goes on forever, doesn't it? And I've only scratched the surface of what this remote can do. Right now, I'm checking the weather via Wi-Fi on the MX-5000 touchscreen in five cities simultaneously with one button push. I installed a URC MRF-260 RF receiver, so now I don't have to aim the remote anymore. I have an iPod Touch, so I may just get into controlling that as well. (The MX-5000 actually adds some secret iPod controls that even the iPod doesn't have!) Of course, I gotta try that PC media control, seeing as it's free and all.
When you invest in the one device that you'll interface with more than all other devices combined, in my opinion, you need to really, really dig it. I dig the MX-5000 the most. Is it worth $1200?
And then some.
1 comments:
Love this Remote. I am a Pioneer Elite dealer. Any word on when they may provide 2-way support on internet connected models such as the VSX-94THX and newer?
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