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With the plethora of touchscreen remote controls suddenly available on the consumer market, one might wonder what appeal a regular buttoned universal remote might offer. Well, the answer came to me late one night as I was watching a movie. I wanted to rewind the film to review a certain scene over again, but as I was using a touchscreen model, I had to bring the remote up from under the blanket, turn the backlight on and find the button. Recalling years past, where I simply felt for the proper shaped button without ever looking at the controller, I decided it was time again to see what traditional remotes could offer the avid home theater user.
The aptly titled Home Theater Master SL-9000 goes quite a bit beyond the "traditional" moniker by offering a total of 55 buttons in various shapes plus 10 macros and an informative (if small) LCD screen. The unit will control up to 8 devices and comes preprogrammed with many popular brands of receivers, TVs, VCRs, satellite systems and DVD players. Setting up a preprogrammed device couldn�t be simpler: press the �device� and �mute� buttons simultaneously for 3 seconds then enter a three-digit code from the manual. The SL-9000 then sends out the power signal for that device � if it works press the �device� button to save the setup, or enter in a new three-digit code to try again. It also provides an auto code search utility if you can�t immediately find a functional set, whereby the channel up/down buttons scan through all available power signals.
I found that for the most part pre-programmed signals were assigned to button labels that reflected that function, however my VCR�s secondary functions appeared to be haphazardly placed on completely unrelated buttons. Fortunately you can clean this up with the SL-9000�s full-featured learning capabilities.
Learning & Macros
The learning process is quite straightforward even though it involves a somewhat eccentric double-learn technique. Once you�ve entered learn mode and selected the button to teach you must hold down the original remote�s key for three seconds then release it. The SL-9000 flashes "Retry", and once again you have to hold down that button. This time the SL-9000 flashes "Good" and the code is learned. When you�re finished learning commands for that particular device the setup must be saved by pressing the �device� and �play� buttons. The remote took everything I threw at it save, as usual, those quirky Sony input signals. I�m uncertain of how much space is actually provided for learned signals, but there was more than enough room for everything I required.
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