13iron,

The manual will tell you how to check your firmware version. It's not something that the codes on the side of the television will be able to tell. I believe your remote is the latest available, as I'm unaware of a change of remote controls in this series. The band that travels up and down may be normal if it's not overlight bright, and if that's the case, some of that "band" is inherent with the DLP screens.

--HDTech