IVB
Senior Member
I'm *this* close to being client-less, and using Sage HDExtenders for everything.
I just put in an extender in the H/T media closet. Of course, the second it was done, the wife decided she wanted to watch a netflix DVD that we had so we had to resort back to the HTPC to play that back. So, today I went & got a Marantz DV6001 DVD player with RS232. It was on clearance @Magnolia for $170 so it seemed like a decent deal. I wanted 2way for superior logic-coding ability, but given how rarely we watch physical DVDs I wasn't going to spend much on it.
The hardest part has been figuring out how to use a hardbutton remote control for everything. I'm sure the pros have this figured out as they do it 100 times, but this is the first time i've had to think through this. I've been crutching on the Bluetooth mouse for the mentally difficult stuff. Although I have an MX850 with multi-page support, I didn't want to use more than 1 page as the wife & 6 yr old kid will get baffled and call me, which defeats the point.
Here's what I came up with. I used line #s on the picture, i'll explain those below.
The system is wired such that the 3 component video & audio streams run to the Denon3805, which does the switching.
Line 2/4/5 select which component video stream you want, and sets the Denon to that.
Line 1 is just there for while I run redundant systems, hopefully it's pulled out within 7 days.
Line 3 & 6 are specific to Sage, and either go to the home menu or the recorded shows.
The rest of the buttons rely on CQC to determine what the current device is (as determined by the current source input on the Denon), and only pass it the appropriate command (ie pause/play).
Line 7 is an example of some pretty cool usage of the 2way Sage TCP driver. As you may know, there's 4 different right arrows on the standard SageHDExtender remote, which do:
While on a menu:
- move cursor right
While playing video:
During Video Playback:
- Fast Forward
- Skip Ahead 30 seconds
- Skip Ahead 3 minutes
So the big question is how to simplify that. Too many damn buttons on that Sage remote for me. I decided that
1) we never need to FFW as we are content with skip ahead.
2) I can use the 2 current MX850 buttons (right and next) for the 30 sec/3min/right by first checking to see if the HDExtender is in Play mode. If it is, then the right button must mean skip 30secs. If not, then it must be in browse mode, so move right.
The volume buttons act directly against the Denon, but everything else is analyzed by CQC to determine where it should send what.
I just finished that up an hour or two ago, so i'll sit with this to see how it feels. I already found some holes in the logic that you see as fixed, who knows what else is out there.
I just put in an extender in the H/T media closet. Of course, the second it was done, the wife decided she wanted to watch a netflix DVD that we had so we had to resort back to the HTPC to play that back. So, today I went & got a Marantz DV6001 DVD player with RS232. It was on clearance @Magnolia for $170 so it seemed like a decent deal. I wanted 2way for superior logic-coding ability, but given how rarely we watch physical DVDs I wasn't going to spend much on it.
The hardest part has been figuring out how to use a hardbutton remote control for everything. I'm sure the pros have this figured out as they do it 100 times, but this is the first time i've had to think through this. I've been crutching on the Bluetooth mouse for the mentally difficult stuff. Although I have an MX850 with multi-page support, I didn't want to use more than 1 page as the wife & 6 yr old kid will get baffled and call me, which defeats the point.
Here's what I came up with. I used line #s on the picture, i'll explain those below.
The system is wired such that the 3 component video & audio streams run to the Denon3805, which does the switching.
Line 2/4/5 select which component video stream you want, and sets the Denon to that.
Line 1 is just there for while I run redundant systems, hopefully it's pulled out within 7 days.
Line 3 & 6 are specific to Sage, and either go to the home menu or the recorded shows.
The rest of the buttons rely on CQC to determine what the current device is (as determined by the current source input on the Denon), and only pass it the appropriate command (ie pause/play).
Line 7 is an example of some pretty cool usage of the 2way Sage TCP driver. As you may know, there's 4 different right arrows on the standard SageHDExtender remote, which do:
While on a menu:
- move cursor right
While playing video:
During Video Playback:
- Fast Forward
- Skip Ahead 30 seconds
- Skip Ahead 3 minutes
So the big question is how to simplify that. Too many damn buttons on that Sage remote for me. I decided that
1) we never need to FFW as we are content with skip ahead.
2) I can use the 2 current MX850 buttons (right and next) for the 30 sec/3min/right by first checking to see if the HDExtender is in Play mode. If it is, then the right button must mean skip 30secs. If not, then it must be in browse mode, so move right.
The volume buttons act directly against the Denon, but everything else is analyzed by CQC to determine where it should send what.
I just finished that up an hour or two ago, so i'll sit with this to see how it feels. I already found some holes in the logic that you see as fixed, who knows what else is out there.
In other words, why must you rip the rented movie from Netflix where your wife wanted to play a newly-rented movie from Netflix?
