Still one of my favorite remotes for my home theater
Written: Mar 07 '01 (Updated Mar 09 '01)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: labellable soft keys, almost reasonable price, does everything I need
Cons: size, battery life could be better, range could be better
The Bottom Line: The solution to a complicated home theater, it's completely programmable and faster than a touchscreen model. It's all you really need.
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| raytsui's Full Review: Marantz RC2000 MK II Remote Control |
The Marantz RC2000Mk2 is a programmable learning remote control that is designed as a one stop replacement remote for your home theater needs. I've owned this remote for two years now and I still like it very much despite buying a fancier Philips Pronto. It's designed to completely remove remote clutter. Being a programmable remote, the Marantz remote can learn all the functions of all your original infrared remotes. Every button of this remote can be taught codes from your original remote. To teach a button, you point the original remote at a bottom of the Marantz, press a button on the Marantz you want to learn and the corresponding button on the original remote. And then repeat for all the other buttons.
The remote is divided into two sections. One section has a number of backlightable buttons such number keys, play, stop, cursor pad, channel up down etc. The top half contains a LCD panel with a bunch of keys on both sides. Below that are buttons to select one of 10 different devices. The idea of the keys beside the LCD panel is that they are programmable, you can teach them commands and then label their functions on the LCD panel with their actual function name. For each device you have up to four "pages" of these buttons, and since there are 10 keys, that means you have up to 40 customizable labellable buttons.
One problem with the LCD panel is that the button labels are only up to four characters each. Entering the labels is easy enough, you just enter letters like you would programming a cell-phone, but having only four characters means some labels will look a bit cryptic. For example I labelled the button "CRST" for the counter reset button. I know it's COUNTER RESET but a stranger may not understand what I meant.
It's good to plan out on a piece of paper what you want every button to say and where it is located so you don't miss any or duplicate any buttons. The learning process is easy but a bit time consuming since you will be teaching every button from your original remote; the Marantz does not come preprogrammed with any other brand except Philips/Marantz products. Unfortunately, all the labels in the LCD screen are preset to something already. For buttons that I didn't program, I had to go in a manually blank out the preassigned labels by adding space characters. It would have been nice if you could reset the labels more easily.
Since you can assign the functions of every single button, it's simple to have "punch through" functions. For example, if I select DVD, I can assign the volume control to control my receiver when I have DVD mode selected. All I have to do is teach the volume keys with my receiver remote when in DVD device mode. It's simple to choose whatever scheme you want since every single button in every mode is distinct and programmable.
There are also four different buttons marked "1" to "4" that can be used to program macros. Macros are basically a recorded sequence of keys that get executed when you press the macro buttone. The remote allows you to edit the macros after they have been defined. And you can also control the individual delay for every keystroke inside the macro...NICE. This is handy to slow down the codes in case the component cannot pick up the codes as fast as the Marantz remote is sending them out. One drawback is that the macro buttons only say 1 to 4 so you have to remember what they do after the fact.
The remote is quite big and a bit front heavy. Using lighter NiMH rechargeables should help balance it out a bit. I get decent enough life out a cheap alkalines, about two months. I recommend leaving the auto backlight off since it kills the battery fast. The backlight works well enough but I don't find I really need it during average lighting conditions. You can manually activate the backlight by pressing a button on the side of the remote. This Mark 2 version remembers all the codes even if the batteries go completely dead.
The layout is intuitive enough and the buttons have a good tactile feel. You can turn on audible beeps for the buttons also. As I mentioned it's quite front heavy. Sometimes it's a bit awkward to operate with less than two hands. This remote works best with two hands or tabletop operation. Some of the buttons such as the cursor buttons are a bit small but overall, I don't find fault with their operation after I got used to them.
The remote has good range although it seems weaker than some of my original remotes. My Panasonic VCR only accepts codes from the Marantz when I point it directly at the VCR's sensor. It's definitely not as strong as my Sony TV remote where I can point anywhere in the room and my TV will pick it up.
One handy tip is to dedicate one LCD page of one device to contain all the power buttons for all your components. This makes it easy to power down or up your system.
This remote retails for about $200 USD and can be had for less if you shop around. I think it's a very competent remote. It bypasses the pitfall of other learning remotes with fixed keys. The fact that you can label buttons using the LCD screen means that the button label will always represent the true function. This is its most significant advantage over the ALL-FOR-ONE remotes that don't have customizable labels. It's truly a one stop solution for remote clutter. Compared to the popular Philips Pronto remote, this remote is cheaper, offers real tactile buttons that allows it to be operated by feel. It's one of the best hard buttoned remotes I've used. I also own a Philips Pronto which is a boon for my wife, but personally I prefer this Marantz for everyday use...it's less likely to break during a fall, I can operate it by feel and it's faster to use overall. With the Marantz, critical operations like the transport or cursor pad are real buttons. If you want the job done, this remote is all you really need.
So in the end, I recommend this remote very much in light of all the fancier remotes that have come into the market in the last year or so.
For more info, go to www.marantz.com which has a picture of the remote.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
raytsui
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Location: Ontario, Canada
Reviews written: 17
Trusted by: 4 members
About Me:
I'm a technical professional who loves driving and gadgets.
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