Or has the remote been completely redesigned and created just for the RIO Car? Did I miss this post somewhere?

Yeah, you missed a bunch of posts.

The Rio remote has a different button layout, and uses a completely different set of IR codes. Instead of using Kenwood codes, it uses codes that are proprietary to the empeg/Rio Car. So it won't interfere with, say, Kenwood head units.

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Tony Fabris