Out of Control®

Like many people, we still use a VCR. No TiVo or Digital Recording device, nor fancy computer setup to record out television shows. Just a VCR. Maybe you don't know what a VCR is? It is an ancient device from times past that allows one to record analog television signals onto a magentic tape, for playback at a later time on a television. VCR's were first introduced in 1972 by Phillips and became quite widely available in the 1980's.

Last night while watching the recorded television show "24" with Kieffer Sutherland, we got tired of having to jump up and fast forward our VCR everytime a commercial came along. Your thinking "Why the heck doesn't he use the remote control" to which I say "We lost the remote control." So, while sitting watching the show, and twiddling with my satellite dish remote, a thought occurred. Hey, my satellite remote is programmable, since we have the TV, satellite receiver and Stereo (not 'Home Theatre') already programmed. The problem when we first got the satellite about 5 years ago, was that our VCR was so old it did not appear in the list of programmable VCR's, and since back then we still had our remote, we really didn't have a need to program the satellite remote.

After my legs were worn out from racing to and from the TV throughout 2 hours of "24"--which incidently is only about 88 minutes once the ads are taken out--I went to my large box of instruction manuals and warranties. After a thorough search I realized that we no longer had the instruction manual for our satellite setup either. Luckily this is the age of the Internet, so I sat down and used our trusty Google to do a search for our satellite dish and IR remote model number. Well, if you have ever searched for anything to do with satellite dishes on Google, then you know all too well that Google simply returns hundreds and hundreds of crappy spammish index/search engine sites with no information on them what-so-ever. Luckily for me, the company we pay to have our satellite signal from "Bell Canada Express Vu", had the answer.

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Below are the instructions on how to program your IR Remote, model Number 103781

Within 2 minutes, actually 6 years and 2 minutes, I finally got that VCR button on my IR Remote to do something useful. Just a shame that the remote is so old that those top four buttons hardly work anymore :-)

Steps to program your remote control to operate your TV, VCR, Home entertainment system.

1. Turn your TV/VCR/Home Theatre on.
2. Press and hold the TV or VCR or Aux mode button until all the other mode buttons light up.
3. Press the blank POWER button. (If your remote only has one POWER button, press that one)
4. Press the UP ARROW button repeatedly until your TV turns off. Don't do this too fast you you will need to start over again, if you click past the right setting.
5. Press the POUND (#) button to confirm.

That's it. I did the above and now my remote happily saves my legs when watching my recorded shows.