Customizing Your RC5400

3.

User Guide

Complex Operation? Macro or Help...

If your entire system is new to you, practice using the RC5400 manually for a few days before programming any macros. You’ll find that your home theater requires many operations that require multiple steps to do. You have to decide whether to use a:

Macro - The entire operation happens in an automated sequence when you touch one button.

Help List - The operation happens manually but is prompted by large sequentially numbered buttons with friendly labels on one sequence of pages linked together.

Some multiple step operations require you to make decisions before you proceed. An example is turning on a non-Marantz home theater system. Many components turn on and off with a single “Power” button. Before you press a “Power” button, the manufacturer expects you to look at the component to see whether it is on or off. If you want it on and it’s off, you press the “Power” button. If you forget to look, and it is already on, you will turn it off when you press the “Power” button. The Remote cannot “look” at your components to see if they are on or off. So, if you recorded a macro intended to power up a non- Marantz home theater, it wouldn’t be very reliable.

Here’s an example:

Your spouse goes out to the local video store and rents a video tape. When he/she gets home, they pop the tape in the VCR (most VCR’s automatically turn on when a tape is inserted). Your spouse touches the macro button you programmed to power up the system. The recorded sequence of “power” buttons is played back. Unfortunately, since the VCR was already on, it is now off and everything else is on. Your spouse sees no picture, assumes the macro didn’t work, so he/she touches the button again. This time, the macro turns the VCR on and every thing else off. Frustrating!

Marantz builds components that are “macro-friendly”. Instead of a single “power” button, the remote controls have a discrete “On” and a discrete “Off” button. With a Marantz system, you can record a Macro that is very reliable from a series of “On” commands. Take a look at the example ALL ON and ALL OFF macros preprogrammed in the default configuration.

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