The Story of My Life

There are STILL a few issues outstanding on the A/V system. One of them is getting my old Marantz receiver set up to drive the whole house audio system (ceiling speakers). They came back the other day to tackle this and some other things. I had to work and couldn't be there. Liane called asking where the remote is for the Marantz. It hadn't occurred to me that they'd need it, but of course for some of the more arcane commands it can be useful to "learn" them from the old remote rather than relying on a database of commands available on-line.  This is a problem because the remote is no longer functional. I bought an extra one a number of years ago and it also eventually failed. Fortunately prior to these failures I had programmed all of the commands into the Harmony remote systems I replaced them with. Those had been the backbone of controlling our A/V system in the old house. So my idea was to dig that stuff out so they could learn the commands from them. The problem is there are four active remotes, which between them share three RF receivers and IR repeaters. The idea is that the remotes broadcast an RF signal, which is received by the RF receivers and translated into IR commands that are then sent to one of a number of IR transmitters, which are affixed to the IR receiver on each of the hi-fi devices in question. Realizing I had to now explain a lot of this to Liane so she could cobble the system back together I knew we were in for a long and frustrating conversation. But I wanted to get it done, rather than wait for them to have to come back again another day. Because I had some meetings to go to I had to talk her through it and then hope that between her and the integrators they could make it work.

(Believe it or not I edited this down from the real dialog that ensued)

David: You need to go to the mechanical room and find a box up on the shelves labeled Harmony Remotes.

Liane: Which shelf?

David: Not sure, but I think it's on the top of the east one.

Liane: Which one is that?

David: The one in the direction of the master bedroom.

Liane: No, that's the west one.

David: No....oh yeah, you're right.

Liane: (reading what's written on each of several boxes)...I don't see one labeled Harmony. Some of them aren't marked.

David: They are all marked, but I'm not sure it's there. We need to check.

Liane: (getting frustrated) I don't see it.

David: Try the south shelf. Top.

Liane: I don't see it.

David: You have to look carefully. I am 99% sure it's on one of those.

Liane: What does the box look like?

David: About two feet long, by one foot wide, and eight inches high.

Liane: What color?

David Brown.

Liane: Are you sure it's marked?

David: 100%. I marked it in big black marker.

Liane: I think I found it, but it's going to be hard to get to.

David: Yeah, I had to cram a lot of stuff in there.

Liane: I have to get this VHS box off of it. I hate this crappy-ass ladder you have down here. It's so rickety. If you hear a loud crash call 911.

David: Ha, ha, okay.

Liane: Oh my! This VHS box is really heavy, and it's coming apart.

[Loud Crash]

Liane: OW! 

David: Hello? What happened?

Liane: I fell.

David: Are you okay?

Liane: Yes. This is such a pain! I told you this ladder sucks!

David: Do you want to just tell them to come back another time?

Liane: No, let's keep going. How do I open the box?

David: Uh, cut it? There is a razor knife out on the table next to the door.

Liane: Hang on....

Liane: It was over on the window sill (read, you were wrong dumb-ass) Okay, I am in the box. I don't see any Harmonies.

David: Well, they are in there. Tell me what you see.

Liane: (frustrated) I don't know...a bunch of wires, some boxes. I see boxes for the Marantz remotes. Feels like they are in there.

David: They are.

Liane: Can't we just give them one of those?

David: You can try to put batteries in them and see if one of them will wake up and kinda' work. One of them does sorta' work I think.

Liane: Crap. With the kitchen all dismantled I don't know where the batteries are.

David: Well, I'm not confident they'd work anyway. Let's just try to get a Harmony one going. You need to dig through there and find them.

Liane: I see three Harmony boxes, but none have anything in them. Oh, wait! One of them has a remote in it.

David: We can't use that one. It doesn't work. There are three or four in there loose. In total there are two silver ones and two black ones.

Liane: I don't see them.

David: I am sure they are there. You have to dig.

(This goes back and forth several more times.)

Liane, there is a brown box in here.

David: Yes, look in that.

Liane: That's it. I have them.

David: (frustrated) Jeez - when I say you have to dig I really mean through everything. 

Liane: You could have packed this a lot better.

David: Probably, but if you remember that was one of the last things to go, and we were in a bit of a hurry. Tell me what is on the back of them.

Liane: Nothing

David: No, some of them have labels on the back for what they were for, like bedroom, etc. I programmed each of them a little differently depending on where we would use them most. 

Liane: Nothing. Oh, wait, one of them says bedroom.

David: Which one?

Liane: Huh?

David: Is it one of the black ones?

Liane: No, it's a silver one.

David: Okay, let's not try to use that one. Let's use the other silver one. First you will have to get it charged. You need to dig out one of the charging cradles and a power supply. Get it on there and get it charging. Then we need to find its matching RF receiver.

Liane: Huh?

David: So you can understand what we're trying to do I need to refresh your memory on how these worked.

Liane: Oh no...

David: (summarized) Remote sends RF to RF receiver, then it translates to IR, which then sends the proper codes out of the four independent IR ports on the RF receiver. ONE, and only ONE of those four ports will carry the proper codes to operate the Marantz receiver, but because those ports never got marked anywhere but in the programming software we will have to try all of them.

Liane: What's the RF receiver?

David: (explaining it all again) It's the little bulbous looking thing that has a wire coming out of it, some jacks, and some LED's.

Liane: Okay, well, I found one that has a wire to a little jack thingy.

David: We don't want to use that one. We want one that has a wire that goes all the way to a power supply.

Liane: Here is one.

David: What does it say on the back of it?
Liane: Nothing.
David: Some of them will have labels, just like the handheld part, however, the writing got pretty faded towards the end from the heat of the hi-fi cabinet, so you may not be able to read it. But we need to try to find one with a label on the back.
Liane: This one does.
David: And what does it say?

Liane: Bed.

David: Nope, we need the other one.

Liane: Why?

David: It might work, but I can remember how to get where we want better on the receiver for the other sliver one, or either of the black ones.

Laine: Okay, I have another one, but it isn't labeled.
David: Does it have a power supply attached?
Liane: Wait, I have to dig separate all these wires from it....Yes, it's attached.

David: Good. That's the one we'll use. Now, you see those four jacks in a row on the one side?

Liane: Yes.

David: That's where the little Inrfra-Red eyes plug in?

Liane: Eyes? 

David: (frustrated) Whatever you want to call them. Tell me, so we can communicate. Those are the infra-red nodules that will send the actual IR signal to the device in question. You need to find four of those -- one to plug in to each of the four ports.

Liane: Where are they?

David: (frustrated) In the box. There is a plastic bag with all of that stuff in it.

Liane: Oh, hell. That's a rats nest. I got one out. It actually has two on it. It's like a Y-cable.

David: Oh yeah, each plug went to two of the IR transmitters. That doesn't help us. We actually need four plugs, which I know means we'll have a total of eight of the little IR nodules.

Liane: Huh?

David: (explains it all again)

Liane: Here's a big, red bulbous thing. Will that work?

David: No, that goes to something else.
Liane: Here's one of those Pyramid things? Can we just use that?
David: No, that won't help us.

Liane: (frustrated) David, I don't have time to do all this?

David: Do you want to just tell them to come back?

Liane (martyr voice) No.

David: Okay, once you dig four of those out we have everything we need. But then I need to explain to you how to get it working.

David: (Explanation of how each of the four jacks actually has different info that will run through it, so we have to hook them all up and try them).

Liane: What do I push on the remote?

David: Go to Activities, remember how to do that?

Liane: Yes.

David: Then press 'watch TiVo,' or whatever. Then go to devices and select...I think it was called A/V Receiver, or it may be called SR-18.

Liane: Can't I just go to Devices?

David: Maybe, you can try. I never did that. I had it set up to turn the proper devices on from the activities, and then it would all work from there. I don't know for sure if going to Devices first will work.

Liane: Then what?

David: When you do all that you have to make sure to hold all four of those IR blasters up to the Marantz unit to make sure the commands are working. Once you have verified operation you can give it to Carlos and he can use those transmissions to program his Control 4 stuff.
Liane: Why do I have to hold them all up? That's a pain.
David: Yes. It's because I don't remember which jack on the repeater box is programmed to carry the commands for the Marantz. Three of them will not work. One will. We either have to try them one at a time to learn which one works, OR just hold them all up to it and who cares which one it is. One will work.

Liane: Okay.

When I called her later to see how things went she told me they left without getting it done.

David: What?!

Liane: Well, they were trying to get hold of Marantz for some reason, and they told me that usually in those situations they want you to have the remote in your hand. So they weren't sure they would need it, but wanted to be prepared in case...

David: Oh my. That's frustrating. What a pain. 

Liane: I know. And I'm going to be bruised from falling off that crappy ladder you have down there.

And this, my friends, is the story of my life.