Logitech bought Harmony in ~2005, IIRC and before that sale, calling for support was great- most of the time, the calls were answered by two of the three original employees- one of whom built the first 5000 pieces and they REALLY knew how those models worked. The original Harmony could never have brought out so many new models in such a short time and unfortunately, communication has taken a back seat to putting out new models. They offered remotes that promised things that turned out to be impossible and made life very difficult for people to sell these with any idea that problems wouldn't arise (and bite us on the butt). Then, they killed most of their models and it looked like they were going to pull the plug on Harmony at least, temporarily. My fear for a long time has been: if they pull the plug and kill the whole thing, updates will be impossible because the database and servers are the only way to program these, unlike URC, RTI and several others that put the software and codes on the computer and it's possible to convert to/from Hexidecimal, so codes from other people and databases can be imported without the company being involved.
I never stopped using them, just put up with the BS because it was a good way to get this done without the need to put up with URC/RTI/Universal Electronics/Nevo and other PITA programming. I'm not dumping on your choice- I'm just letting you know that it hasn't been all rainbows and unicorns.
NOTE- When the user doesn't aim the remote toward the equipment and some of the commands don't operate something, you should be able to use the Help button- that's why it's there. Also, you can set the power commands to leave the equipment on when changing from one activity to the others, which allows pressing the activity button again- if the command are discrete, it will cause no problems but if the activity includes what Harmony calls a 'sequence', it will send the added commands that cause the input to scroll, delays, etc.
One of the reasons they set up the buttons and commands the way they do is due to the fact that most people don't like to wade through a few pages of optional buttons, which takes them away from what they're watching or listening to.
One of the things I like most about these is that it is so easy to add buttons to the activities and in the case of the H1000 (which had major problems), I did things with these remotes that Harmony's tech support people told me "That won't work". They worked great and then, after spending a lot of time getting it to work the way I wanted, they discontinued that model and the replacement was incompatible with the old software, so I had to start over for those systems. They did, however, add button locations and functions that made the new one a great alternative.
I still use the 650 and now, they changed the software so I can't organize the 50+ accounts I have for my customers but with the new software, comes the ability to use more devices, so it's not all bad (but it will end up wasting a lot of time for people who used the dealer site). It's a really good low-cost remote that works well. FYI- if the screen starts going dark and it reboots intermittently, change the batteries.
