How I emerged from remote-control hell (almost)

AnchorDesk

How I emerged from remote-control hell (almost)

Patrick Houston
Editorial Director, AnchorDesk
Friday, August 15, 2003

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Two months ago, I wrote a column about the remote-control hell into which I'd descended since buying my new home theater. My family and I love the crystal images and immersive experience of watching a DVD. But it's forced us to face a frustration, too: dealing with no less than three remote controls sporting no fewer than 75 buttons.

Looking for a home-theater system?

ZDNet reviewers like this Pioneer model for its great sound and good picture.

Pioneer HTP-720DV

Since June, however, I've had the chance to experiment with a few universal remote controls that combine the functions of several remotes into one. Based on my experience, I have good news and bad news.

The good news is that the universals I tried are breaking new ground in terms of intelligence, interface, ease of use, and affordability. The bad news is that universal remotes--at least the ones I tested--actually aren't all that universal.

I'LL BEGIN by telling you about the Harmony Remote SST-768l, not just because it emerged as my favorite but also because it uses the Web in such a savvy way. I encountered the device a few months ago during a home-networking exhibition, where Bryan McLeod, CEO of Intrigue Technologies, the young Canadian company that developed the remote, stepped me through a short demonstration you can watch in this video.

Right after that, the company provided me with a unit that I tested with my own home-theater system, which consists of a 34-inch Sony WEGA Trinitron widescreen TV, a Denon DVD-900 DVD player, and a Denon AVR-1603 audio receiver. As home-theater setups go, mine's middle-class, I suppose. But, insofar as it doesn't encompass a TiVo, a VCR, or digital cable set-top box, it's in no way as complicated as many other systems--a fact that will become more material in a minute.

Intrigue Technologies has brought together two main innovations in the Harmony Remote. One is a way not just to replicate and transmit the infrared codes unique to every remote-control device, but also to actually capture and mimic every function therein. The other is to create a giant database of some 20,000 devices--and all their functions--by using the Web and Harmony's burgeoning community of users, what Intrigue's McLeod likens to a Napster for remote controls.

A truly universal remote control? Pat talks with Intrigue Technologies's Bryan McLeod about the Harmony Remote.

Watch now

Harmony's remote connects to your computer (and thus to the Web) via a USB cable that provides a two-way connection. This connection allows you to quickly, easily, and reliably program a Harmony Remote for each of the components you may have in your system. And it allows the Harmony Remote to transmit into the company database all the functions it can learn from one of your existing remotes.

One nice touch: You can teach a Harmony how to do everything your existing remote does by simply placing the two devices end-to-end and beaming the brains of your old remote to the Harmony.

At the Harmony Web site, I registered, downloaded some client software, and typed in the names of my components, all of which already existed in the database.

FROM THAT POINT ON, the Harmony, with the touch of one and only one of its buttons, turned on each of my components. This and this feat alone endeared it to me. But there were a few other features I liked, too. The remote contains a small LCD display that allows you to scroll through commands, like you would with a cell phone. And it allows you to operate your home theater based on the activity in which you want to engage. Scrolling to "watch at DVD," for example, will with one click power up the DVD player, as well as turn on the receiver and the TV to the correct audio and video inputs.

Finally, the remote has a help button that will restore this single-click capability, if, say, one of the components falls out of sync and fails to turn on.

But the Harmony isn't without its shortcomings. While it allows me to control most every function of my home-theater system, figuring out what to press on the device to perform a particular action isn't always that easy. The Harmony has a scroll-and-click wheel on its side--like the one you find on a mouse--to take care of one set of navigational duties, and a second button right beside it to handle others. They aren't all that intuitive, and I still often wind up pressing one when I should be pushing the other.

McLeod says his company will be coming to market by the end of August with a new, more "family-friendly" model that has more conventional buttons to handle some of the remote's most basic functions. I've seen a rendering of the forthcoming device, and it looks as though it may address some of these navigational issues I've cited.

Finally, while the Harmony SST-768 won't break the bank like other universal remotes that top the $1,000 mark, it's still relatively expensive. I can't say that I could justify its $299 price to my wife.

WHICH IS WHY I also want to note a second remote, the Kameleon 8 from Universal Electronics. It debuted in June and carries a suggested retail price of just $99.

What's most noteworthy about the Kameleon is its display--a phosphorescent, plastic touchscreen with "soft" keys that appear and disappear depending on which of the up to eight component devices you want to operate. The display's bright, backlit aqua blue keys also address a persistent problem I have with my remotes: operating them in a dark room.

The Kameleon worked well with the TV and DVD player in the bedroom. But I had trouble programming it to operate the home theater. The instruction manual didn't contain the codes for my receiver. A quick call to a Universal product support specialist--I dialed in just as any other consumer would, by the way--got me the right code and in a pretty slick way: I simply held the remote up to the phone for a modem-like signal that transmitted the right code into the device for me.

Still, even though the Kameleon remote operates each of my three home-theater components, it doesn't do so as readily or as easily as the separate, native remotes do for each one.

And that, in the end, says it all: Whether armed with the Harmony or the Kameleon or any of a few others I've tried--including remote control software on a Pocket PC-based iPaq PDA--I still haven't been able to stash the three separate remotes that continue to clutter the family room.

Because remote controls aren't just a big frustration for many of us but a metaphor for the overwhelming technological complexity of our time, I'm going to continue my search for a really good, affordable universal remote. When I find one, I'll let you know about it.

Are you in remote-control hell? Have you tried any universals? How did they work? TalkBack to me!

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