ATV Gen 1 starts up but wont do anything other than screen saver

My ATV has been sitting unplugged for a while. I set it up again, it boots fine, but won't "listen" to the remote. the status light turns yellow whenever I press a button on the remote, but the ATV doesn't functionally respond, after a few minutes it goes into screen saver and stays there. Is there something wrong with the remote? With the ATV itself? TIA.