Looking for a universal remote

[gavan]

Hi, I'm looking to tidy up my growing stash of remotes with a universal model. It'll have to control Sky+, TV, A/V Amp, DVD player, XBox etc.

Some of the activity based remotes look pretty interesting. However, as I use both a TV and a projector and carry out (the same) activities on both, I'm thinking that could cause problems. Maybe a standard URC with macros and a learning capability where needed, would be a better bet.


What would everyone recommend? I guess one of the Prontos would be guaranteed to do the trick but I've heard bad things about response times and quality of the keys. They're also quite expensive so I don't want to buy one and find out that it doesn't suit me, or has unacceptable niggles.


Gav

[richard plumb]

harmony would be fine. If you do the same activity on different equipment, you'll need two activities.

For example, I have a 'watch DVD' activity (TV as display, TV as audio), and a 'DVD on PJ' activity (projector as display, amp as audio).

Its intelligent enough to know what to turn on and off, and when. Eg if I'm currently watching TV and press 'watch DVD' (used a lot by the missus with the little'uns), then it leaves the TV on, and starts up the DVD player. If I'm watching TV and press 'DVD on PJ', it'll turn the TV off.

This is one big improvement over pronto, where I had to have duplicated activities spawning off each main activity, tweaked depending on the current state.

[rEVILospud]

I was in a similar dilema six months ago or so, and didn't really want to spend much money on yet another remote.
In the end I bought a Sony RM-AV3100 Integrated Remote Control.

This was mainly as I had quite alot of sony equipment and also it only cost me around £50 (eBay, came from America in the end) if I remember correctly.

There's one on eBay at the moment, here,which you may get for a good price.

I have been extremely impressed with this remote and haven't had any problems with it. It didn't bother using pre-programmed codes as the learn function is so easy. Setting up of macros etc. is also supported and a pleasure to use. It is definately a good quality, cheap alternative.

[shahedz]

i would go for harmony, as explained about its extremly intellignet, really simple to set up , i have the 885, i have 2 activities " Watch DVD" and "DVD on pro"

both tunr on dvd player , music amp-set on correct input, except one turns on the projector, and the other the TV,

great remote,

[LFCRules]

Hi Gav,

What's your budget?

Cheers

Andy

[gavan]

Originally Posted by LFCRules

Hi Gav,

What's your budget?

Cheers

Andy

No specific budget set - but more than a couple of hundred quid would be a no-no I guess.

I just want something that lets me get rid of my existing remotes, with minimal resulting compromises in usability of the individual devices.

Those activity-based remotes seem to be all the rage. I can see the attraction of pressing a button to do a specific series of tasks. But, how are they when it comes to controlling specific devices - ie. Replicating the 'real' remote?

I'm thinking it terms of A/V amp and Sky+ usage here, plus possibly a DVD-Recorder later on. These devices have lots of different buttons (numeric pad, joypad, coloured buttons etc) so I don't fancy having to really compromise.


Gav

[scotty38]

There's still device mode for each individual piece of equipment for all the infrequently used commands.

[martin day]

Originally Posted by gavan

No specific budget set - but more than a couple of hundred quid would be a no-no I guess.

I just want something that lets me get rid of my existing remotes, with minimal resulting compromises in usability of the individual devices.

Those activity-based remotes seem to be all the rage. I can see the attraction of pressing a button to do a specific series of tasks. But, how are they when it comes to controlling specific devices - ie. Replicating the 'real' remote?

I'm thinking it terms of A/V amp and Sky+ usage here, plus possibly a DVD-Recorder later on. These devices have lots of different buttons (numeric pad, joypad, coloured buttons etc) so I don't fancy having to really compromise.


Gav

Hi Gav,

You have just made the point that I made in another thread but for which I didn't get an answer. With a DVD recorder there are so many functions now especially with editing on a hard drive etc and I know that you can add these functions on to the screen part of the remote but u don't want to be going thru different screens just to get a function that is readily available on the original remote.

Plus I think that the coloured buttons that SKY uses are an important feature and should be on the universal remotes as hard buttons and not have to be added to the screen area (this is the problem I have as I have a MX500 which is an American remote that obviously doeasn't have the coloured buttons).

[Richard46]

Originally Posted by gavan

I'm thinking it terms of A/V amp and Sky+ usage here, plus possibly a DVD-Recorder later on. These devices have lots of different buttons (numeric pad, joypad, coloured buttons etc) so I don't fancy having to really compromise.


Gav

The UK Harmonys 8 & 6 series have hard labelled numeric; coloured; and up/down left right/ select buttons as well as a set of transport buttons plus hard vol and channel buttons plus dedicated mute and back buttons. I think the 5 series have similar but not seen one myself. The 8 series have eight labelable hard buttons by the lcd screen so for another eight it is neccessary to scroll to the next screen.
The 6 series (no longer in production AFAIK) have 6 per screen and the 5 series logically have 4. The US models lack the coloured buttons. eg the 880.

[stephenashforth]

I have the H655 and, having tried a few different a few differend One For All models, can definitely confirm that it is much, much better then all the OFAs. It took me a while to get the hang of how to set it up via the web site, but once you get the hang of it, the flexibility is astonishing.

The activity concept took a while to catch on my house, but now we use it all the time, rather than the device based mode.

I don't know if the H655 is still available in the shops, but you can still it pick one up on ebay from time to time. I have read that the H885 is even better, but at £140 it would need to be a lot better!

[gavan]

Originally Posted by martin day

Hi Gav,

You have just made the point that I made in another thread but for which I didn't get an answer. With a DVD recorder there are so many functions now especially with editing on a hard drive etc and I know that you can add these functions on to the screen part of the remote but u don't want to be going thru different screens just to get a function that is readily available on the original remote.

Plus I think that the coloured buttons that SKY uses are an important feature and should be on the universal remotes as hard buttons and not have to be added to the screen area (this is the problem I have as I have a MX500 which is an American remote that obviously doeasn't have the coloured buttons).

I suspect that I'll end up using two remotes - the Universal RC and the Sky+ unit. Probably, the Sky+ will be used for casual everyday TV watching whereas the Universal will come out when I want to fire up the projector and amp for movies, or mess around with XBMC.

From the URC, I just need something that lets me operate my equipment with as little (additional) head-scratching as possible.

Regarding DVD editing, I guess I would be prepared to bring out that remote when I wanted to do some cutting prior to burning to DVD.

Right now, I've got remotes for TV, Sky+, DVD, VCR, Xbox, Amp and Projector knocking around my living room. I anticipate adding an XBox360 shortly and replacing the DVD & VCR with a HDD-DVD Recorder. So whichever way you look at it, six remotes to replace - Some of which are going to be pretty complex.


Gav