Based on mostly positive reviews of the Logitech Harmony 880 Universal Remote that I saw in a couple of threads here (there were a few negative reviews, I admit), I bought the 880 over Christmas. I can see that it has great potential, but getting it set up to my taste has been a struggle, and I still don't have everything I want.
I set up three activities, "Watch TV", "Watch DVD" and "Watch Movie", The "Watch DVD" and "Watch Movie" activities do not involve the 622, and they worked fine on my first try. The "Watch TV" activity turned on the TV and set it to the correct input (the 622). But it did not power on the 622. On my first try I did not tell the 880 I had a 622. Based on advice from another thread I told it I had a 942. When that failed completely I went back and redefined "Watch TV" using the 622. That had no effect at all. The 622 would not respond to the 880. So I called customer support. They were helpful, and walked me through teaching the Harmony a few commands (Power Toggle and two others). After the third command the Harmony web site said that it had found a better command set and switched to it. Now the "Watch TV" activity worked.
I wanted to redefine three of the hard keys to be "DVR", "Swap", and "View Live TV". "DVR" was available from the soft keys, but to use the soft keys you have to be in device mode controlling the 622, and then commands to the TV (volume control and mute) don't work without switching the device to TV---a real pain.
Setting the lower left key to be "DVR" was a breeze, because the DVR command is available on the pop up list of 622 commands on the web site. But neither "Swap" nor "View Live TV" appeared in the list. So I thought I would try to teach those commands to the 880 using my original 622 remote. Here I ran into two problems. Based on my reading of the (very sketchy) User Manual, it looks like you can only "teach" soft keys. Yet, based on some comments on older threads, and based on the fact that with Customer Support's help I had taught the Harmony 3 commands, I decided to go ahead and try to teach a hard key. I immediately received an error message saying that the Harmony cannot learn from the 622 remote!!! I was unable to get past this message.
It looks like I will have to go back to customer support. But that is very inconvenient for me because I am normally not home during the support center's hours.
I am disappointed that this device has such problems communicating with the 622. It has absolutely no trouble with my Samsung BD-UP5000 DVD player or my Sony dual DVD/VHS player.
I wonder why so many commands on the 622 remote do not show up in the Harmony web site's pop up list. "Swap" and "View Live TV" seem like basic commands to me, but they do not appear in Harmony's list. There is a command called simply "View" in the list. Is that actually "View Live TV"? I haven't had a chance to try it yet. There is nothing resembling "Swap" on the list.
I also wonder why such a basic command as "DVR" is assigned a soft key in the default set up, even though two hard keys are not assigned to anything!
Finally, I am wondering why so many people here say this device is simple to set up and does everything they want with their 622. Are there multiple 622 command sets in the Logitech database? Am I just unlucky to have stumbled on a non-optimal list? If so, how can I access a better list? And if there are multiple command sets, what did I do wrong to wind up with such a poor set?
I set up three activities, "Watch TV", "Watch DVD" and "Watch Movie", The "Watch DVD" and "Watch Movie" activities do not involve the 622, and they worked fine on my first try. The "Watch TV" activity turned on the TV and set it to the correct input (the 622). But it did not power on the 622. On my first try I did not tell the 880 I had a 622. Based on advice from another thread I told it I had a 942. When that failed completely I went back and redefined "Watch TV" using the 622. That had no effect at all. The 622 would not respond to the 880. So I called customer support. They were helpful, and walked me through teaching the Harmony a few commands (Power Toggle and two others). After the third command the Harmony web site said that it had found a better command set and switched to it. Now the "Watch TV" activity worked.
I wanted to redefine three of the hard keys to be "DVR", "Swap", and "View Live TV". "DVR" was available from the soft keys, but to use the soft keys you have to be in device mode controlling the 622, and then commands to the TV (volume control and mute) don't work without switching the device to TV---a real pain.
Setting the lower left key to be "DVR" was a breeze, because the DVR command is available on the pop up list of 622 commands on the web site. But neither "Swap" nor "View Live TV" appeared in the list. So I thought I would try to teach those commands to the 880 using my original 622 remote. Here I ran into two problems. Based on my reading of the (very sketchy) User Manual, it looks like you can only "teach" soft keys. Yet, based on some comments on older threads, and based on the fact that with Customer Support's help I had taught the Harmony 3 commands, I decided to go ahead and try to teach a hard key. I immediately received an error message saying that the Harmony cannot learn from the 622 remote!!! I was unable to get past this message.
It looks like I will have to go back to customer support. But that is very inconvenient for me because I am normally not home during the support center's hours.
I am disappointed that this device has such problems communicating with the 622. It has absolutely no trouble with my Samsung BD-UP5000 DVD player or my Sony dual DVD/VHS player.
I wonder why so many commands on the 622 remote do not show up in the Harmony web site's pop up list. "Swap" and "View Live TV" seem like basic commands to me, but they do not appear in Harmony's list. There is a command called simply "View" in the list. Is that actually "View Live TV"? I haven't had a chance to try it yet. There is nothing resembling "Swap" on the list.
I also wonder why such a basic command as "DVR" is assigned a soft key in the default set up, even though two hard keys are not assigned to anything!
Finally, I am wondering why so many people here say this device is simple to set up and does everything they want with their 622. Are there multiple 622 command sets in the Logitech database? Am I just unlucky to have stumbled on a non-optimal list? If so, how can I access a better list? And if there are multiple command sets, what did I do wrong to wind up with such a poor set?